mmmsm 


ililil 


YOUR  BIGGEST  JOB 

SCHOOL  or  BUSINESS 


YOUR   BIGGEST   JOB 
SCHOOL  or  BUSINESS 

SOME  WORDS  OF  COUNSEL  FOR  RED-BLOODED  YOUNG 
AMERICANS  WHO  ARE  GETTING  TIRED   OF  SCHOOL 

BY 

HENRY  LOUIS  SMITH,  PH.D.,  LL.D. 

PBE8IDE3I  OP  WABHiaOTOH  ABD  LEE  UBI7KBSITT 


D.  APPLETON  AND  COMPANY 

NEW  YORK  LONDON 

1920 


COPYRIGHT,    1920,   BT 

D.  APPLETON  AND  COMPANY 


HtlRTBU  15  THE  U-1ITMI  STATES  OP  AKOBIGA 


TO 
THE  TEACHERS  OF  AMERICA 

When  our  giant  Democracy  shall  have  outgrown  its 
child-era  of  inexperience  and  crude  experimentalism  and 
become  sane  and  wise;  when  the  children  of  America  are 
rated  as  the  nation's  most  valuable  asset,  its  chief  source  of 
undeveloped  power,  and  its  most  fruitful  field  for  unlimited 
investment;  when  Love  shall  have  become  the  law  of  Life 
and  Service  the  test  and  measure  of  Greatness, — then  will 

this  truth  be  universally  recognized: 
Those  who  train  and  mold  and  inspire  the  young  are  the  real 
Leaders  of  the  peopl* — the  Makers  and  Builders  of  the  Nation. 


PREFACE 

Ardently  as  they  may  desire  it,  neither  parents 
nor  teachers  can  "give"  a  boy  his  education.  It  is 
a  treasure  he  must  dig  out  for  himself  and  the  tas1- 
is  long  and  hard. 

The  same  old  school  house,  the  same  old  teachers 
and  textbooks,  the  relentless  imprisonment,  the 
never-ending  grind  day  after  day,  month  after 
month,  year  after  year,  with  his  boy-nature  Jonging 
all  the  time  for  freedom  and  adventure,  for  the  open 
sky  and  the  great  outdoors — no  wonder  so  many  red- 
blooded  American  boys  grow  weary  of  the  task  and 
urge  their  perplexed  and  distressed  parents  to  let 
them  "quit  school"  and  go  into  business. 

To  fire  the  ambition  and  stiffen  the  backbone  of 
these  restless  and  shortsighted  young  Americans  is 
the  purpose  of  these  heart-to-heart  talks,  which  are 
born  of  cordial  sympathy  with  boy  nature  and  long 
experience  as  parent  and  teacher. 

Some  of  them  were  published  as  leaflet  issues  of 
The  Washington  and  Lee  Bulletin  during  1918  and 
1919.  The  unexpected  and  amazing  reception  given 

vii 


viii  PREFACE 

them  by  parents  and  teachers,  their  republication  in 
scores  of  newspapers  and  magazines,  and  the  hun- 
dreds of  commendatory  letters  received,  convince  me 
that  I  should  accede  to  the  request  of  the  publishers 
and  issue  them  in  more  permanent  form. 

The  supreme  task  of  our  democracy  is  the  right 
training  of  its  future  citizens.  On  our  success  in 
this  great  and  complex  undertaking  depends  the 
future  of  American  civilization.  If  these  informal 
discussions  aid  in  clarifying  a  boy's  vision  and 
lightening  the  task  of  his  parents  and  teachers,  I 
will  be  amply  compensated  for  the  labor  of  love  in- 
volved in  their  preparation. 

HENEY  Louis  SMITH 

LEXINGTON,  VIBGIWIA 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

PKEFACB vii 

CHAPTER  I 

THE  AMERICAN  FREIGHT  TRAIN 

Engines  or  Box-cars?  Which  are  you  building  in  the 
Workshop  of  Youth? 1 

CHAPTER  II 

QUITTING  SCHOOL  FOR  BUSINESS 

Some  words  of  warning  to  the  American  high  school 
student  who  is  stirred  by  the  general  unrest,  tired  of 
the  daily  routine,  and  tempted  by  high  wages  to 
desert  the  monotony  of  the  school  room  for  the  fas- 
cination of  money-making  ........  8 

CHAPTER  III 

GRINDSTONES:   A  STUDY  IN  TOOL-SHARPENING 

For  the  inspiration  and  encouragement  of  those  who  find 
the  schoolroom  a  prison  and  school  study  an  uphill 
road 13 

CHAPTER  IV 

A  NEGLECTED  ART 

A  word  of  counsel  to  American  boys  about  their  first 

big  job 22 

k 


x  CONTENTS 

PAGE 

CHAPTER  V 

THE  KEY  TO  SUCCESS  IN  STUDY 

Some  practical  suggestions  which  will  make  hard  lessons 
easy  and  double  a  student's  hours  of  leisure  ...  28 

CHAPTER  VI 

A  WIDESPREAD  FALLACY  DISPROVED 

A  warning  to  inexperienced  travelers  on  life's  highway 

against  false  sign-boards 35 

CHAPTER  VII 

ON  GETTING  RICH 

For  the  consideration  of  the  ambitious  American  Boy  who 
is  tired  of  books,  bent  on  winning  wealth  and  business 
leadership,  and  beginning  to  believe  that  American 
hustle  and  an  early  start  will  enable  him  to  reach 
his  goal  more  quickly  than  book-learning  and  a 
college  diploma 41 

CHAPTER  VIII 

THE  CASH  VALUE  OP  BOOK-LEARNING 

A  few  hard  facts  for  the  schoolboy  who  asks  the  question: 
Do  High  School  Studies  Pay?  and  for  the  parent  who 
finds  it  hard  to  see  any  connection  between  book- 
learning  and  money-making  48 

CHAPTER  IX 

FIRST  LESSON  OF  THE  WORLD  WAR:  VALUE  OF  MORALE 

If  our  school-armies  of  young  Americans  will  but  learn 
and  practice  this  greatest  lesson  of  the  greatest 
war,  our  stern  teacher's  huge  tuition  fees  of  blood 
and  tears  and  taxes  will  prove  a  wise  and  dividend- 
paying  investment  54 


CONTENTS  xi 

PAGE 

CHAPTER  X 

A  BQUAEE  DEAL  FOB  THE  HOME  FOLKS 

A  word  of  sympathetic  counsel  for  boys  who  are  passing 
through  the  "Troublesome  Period"  immediately 
preceding  manhood.  Commended  also  to  the  at- 
tention of  their  perplexed  and  sometimes  indignant 
parents 62 

CHAPTER  XI 

COLLEGE  AND  UNIVERSITY  TRAINING 

Some  important  facts  for  the  consideration  of  perplexed 
parents  and  ambitious  young  men 69 

CHAPTER  XII 

THE  HOME  HALF  OF  COLLEGE  PREPARATION 

Some  additional  facts  of  great  importance  to  boys  pre- 
paring for  college  and  to  their  parents  ....  74 


YOUR  BIGGEST  JOB 
SCHOOL  or  BUSINESS 

CHAPTER  I 

THE  AMERICAN   FREIGHT  TEAIST 

ENGINES  or  BOX-CARS?    Which  are  you  build- 
ing in  the  workshop  of  youth? 

A  freight  train  isn't  built  for  show.  .From  its 
roaring  engine  to  its  grimy  crew  it  stands  for  serv- 
ice. Compared  with  its  surpassing  usefulness  and 
value  the  Cannon-ball  Limited,  with  its  gleaming 
paint  and  flying  Pullmans,  is  a  mere  toy.  Huge, 
powerful,  tireless,  efficient,  the  American  freight 
train  is  at  once  the  symbol  and  the  mainstay  of  our 
twentieth  century  democratic  American  civiliza- 
tion. 

i 


2  YOUE  BIGGEST  JOB 

ITS  Two  PABTS 

It  consists  of  two  parts,  joined  in  a  common  task, 
yet  essentially  different — the  engine,  with  its  fire 
and  steam,  chug-chugging  in  front,  and  the  long  line 
of  loaded  cars  obediently  grinding  along  behind. 

Note  carefully  their  many  differences.  The  en- 
gine is  single,  the  cars  are  many.  The  engine  is 
elaborate  and  very  costly,  the  cars  are  simple  and 
inexpensive.  To  oil  and  run  and  feed  the  engine, 
the  railroad  company  furnishes  at  least  two  expert 
and  highly-paid  workmen.  The  same  number  of 
ordinary  brakemen  attend  to  fifty  cars.  If  the  en- 
gine gets  out  of  order,  the  whole  train  stops;  an  ail- 
ing car  is  cut  out  and  left  behind.  After  a  wreck 
the  engine  is  sent  back  to  the  shop  to  be  rebuilt;  the 
wrecked  cars  are  often  burnt  as  useless  junk. 

The  helpless  cars  have  to  carry  whatever  is  put 
into  them — coal,  ore,  dirt,  live-stock,  scrap-iron;  the 
engine  carries  no  load  but  its  own  fire  and  steam. 
The  engine  leads  the  way,  starts  and  stops  as  it 
pleases,  chooses  the  speed  and  the  route,  always 
commands;  the  cars,  to  be  useful,  must  obey  and 
follow. 


THE  AMERICAN  FREIGHT  TRAIN       3 

THEIR  ESSENTIAL  DIFFERENCE 

What  makes  an  engine  such  a  privileged  aris- 
tocrat ?  Here  is  the  secret  in  a  nutshell.  All  engines 
of  every  type  possess  motive-power,  not  only  enough 
to  move  themselves,  hut  a  surplus  which  can  pull 
whole  trains  hehind  them.  Freight  cars  are  of  many 
useful  kinds — box-cars,  gondolas,  flat-cars,  coal-cars, 
cattle-cars — hut  all  are  alike  in  this,  they  have  no 
motive-power  of  their  own.  This  fatal  defect  dooms 
them  to  he  followers  all  their  lives. 

WHERE  IT  ORIGINATED 

The  difference  originated  in  the  railroad  work- 
shop. If  the  head-workman  wanted  an  engine,  he 
prepared  the  design  and  blue-prints  of  an  engine, 
selected  materials  suitable  for  engine  construction, 
and  ordered  his  workmen  to  shape  the  materials  ac- 
cording to  the  engine  blue-prints.  Exactly  the  same 
process,  using  different  materials  and  shaping  them 
to  a  different  design,  would  have  produced  a  useful 
but  helpless  box-car.  The  question,  as  you  see,  is 
settled  in  the  workshop  during  the  short  building 
period.  As  the  completed  car  or  engine  leaves  the 


4  TOUR  BIGGEST  JOB 

shop  so  it  will  remain,  however  long  its  years  of 
service. 

Two  KINDS  OF  MEN 

All  those  who  are  doing  the  world's  work  and 
carrying  the  world's  burdens  may  be  divided  into 
two  widely  different  classes,  those  of  the  engine  type, 
built  to  pull  and  push  and  lead,  rich  in  the  posses- 
sion of  surplus  motive-power,  moving  under  their 
own  steam;  and  the  vast  multitude  of  those  who 
follow,  built  after  many  differing  designs,  but  all 
according  to  freight-car  blue-prints,  with  no  fire- 
box, no  steam-chest,  no  motive-power  of  their  own. 

YOTJTH  THE  WORKSHOP 

Youth  is  the  workshop  where  the  men  of  the  next 
generation  are  built.  You  yourself  are  the  head 
workman,  the  planner  and  builder  of  your  own 
habits  and  character.  Whether,  when  you  roll  out 
of  youth's  workshop  onto  the  great  four-track  high- 
way of  Manhood,  you  will  be  pushed  out  as  a  freight 
car  or  roll  out  under  your  own  steam,  throbbing 
with  power  and  ready  for  leadership,  depends  on 


THE  AMERICAN  FKEIGHT  TRAIN       5 

the  design  you  select  and  the  building  you  do  in  the 
formative  years  of  boyhood. 


How  TO  MAKE  A  FREIGHT  CAB  OF  YOUBSELF 

Building  freight  cars  is  a  simple  job.  The  mate- 
rials are  abundant  and  easy  to  work  with.  You 
will  be  strongly  tempted,  therefore,  to  join  the  great 
throng  of  the  weak-willed  and  short-sighted  who 
sacrifice  the  long  future  for  the  sake  of  an  easy 
time  in  the  workshop  of  youth.  Perhaps  you  are 
already  losing  your  motive-power. 

If  you  must  be  continually  reminded  of  your 
known  duties,  made  to  get  up  and  made  to  go 
to  bed,  told  when  to  study  and  when  to  go  to  school ; 
if  you  are  forming  the  habit  of  waiting  for  orders, 
shirking  hard  jobs  till  forced  to  perform  them, 
standing  idle  on  the  track  till  other  people  push 
or  pull  you,  you  may  know  that  you  are  drifting 
into  the  freight  car  class.  Unless  you  reverse  the 
process,  your  life  will  be  spent  taking  orders  from 
those  of  your  fellow  workmen  who  were  wise  enough 
and  strong  enough  while  in  youth's  workshop  to 
tackle  the  job  of  engine  building. 


THE  SECRET  OF  ENGINE  BUILDING 

The  secret  of  engine  building  is  the  cultivation 
and  development  of  motive-power.  Take,  therefore, 
as  your  daily  working  motto,  "Without  being  told." 
Attend  to  your  regular  daily  tasks,  study  your  let»- 
sons,  run  your  errands,  keep  your  engagements, 
attack  your  hated  jobs,  pay  your  debts,  make  your 
decisions — all  under  your  own  steam,  without  a  word 
of  command  or  reminder  from  anybody.  Every  ob- 
stacle in  your  pathway  driven  aside  by  your  own 
motive-power,  every  victory  won  unaided,  every 
right  opinion  held  and  acted  on  against  the  will  of 
others,  every  temptation  successfully  resisted — is  an 
effective  hammer-blow  shaping  your  character  ac- 
cording to  the  plans  and  specifications  of  an  Engine. 

THE  WAGES  OF  THE  ENGINE  BUILDER 

Your  workshop  period  is  short,  your  life  on  the 
great  highway  long.  The  world  is  always  over- 
supplied  with  men  of  the  freight-car  type;  it  is 
always  hungry  for  locomotives,  eager  to  discover, 
promote,  and  reward  them. 

Do  not  sacrifice  fifty  years  of  manhood's  success 


THE  AMERICAN  FREIGHT  TRAIN      7 

and  happiness  for  a  half-dozen  of  boyhood  ease  and 
idleness.  Do  not  be  misled  by  the  common  belief 
that  a  lazy  and  unsuccessful  boyhood  is  a  happy  one. 
It  isn't  true.  Failures  are  not  really  happy,  either 
in  the  workshop  or  out  on  the  track;  they  only  pre- 
tend to  be. 

Years  of  observation  convince  me  that  in  youth's 
workshop  the  engine-builders  are,  as  a  rule,  far 
happier  than  the  childish  drifters  trying  to  "have 
a  good  time."  To  shape  stubborn  materials  into  an 
engine  is  no  easy  task,  but  its  rewards  begin  at  once. 
The  esteem  and  admiration  of  your  friends,  the 
approval  of  your  own  conscience,  the  gratification 
of  your  parents,  the  consciousness  of  growing  power 
and  increasing  influence,  the  deep  inner  satisfaction 
which  accompanies  success — all  these  may  be  yours 
in  boyhood.  They  pay  rich  dividends  on  the  toil 
and  self-denial  of  engine  building  before  you  leave 
the  workshop,  and  these  dividends  will  be  doubled 
and  redoubled  without  limit  when  you  roll  out  on 
the  great  highway  under  your  own  steam,  a  high- 
powered  locomotive,  built  for  life-long  leadership, 
and  sure  of  life-long  success. 


CHAPTER  II 


SCHOOL   FOB  BUSINESS 

Some  words  of  warning  to  the  American  high  school 
student  who  is  stirred  by  the  general  unrestf 
tired  of  the  daily  routvne,  and  tempted  by  high 
wages  to  desert  the  monotony  of  the  schoolroom 
for  the  fascination  of  money-jmaking. 

Never  have  textbooks  seemed  so  uninteresting 
and  the  daily  school  routine  so  tiresome  as  now. 
An  epidemic  of  dissatisfaction  and  unrest  affects 
the  whole  country.  The  flood  of  immigrants  has 
been  shut  off  so  long  that  every  industry  is  short  of 
workers  and  offering  splendid  positions  with  un- 
heard of  wages  to  boys  of  your  age.  You  never  had 
before  and  may  never  have  again  such  a  chance  to 
make  money.  Shall  you  keep  on  grinding  over  dry 
textbooks,  shut  Tip  in  school  every  day  like  a  convict 
in  a  penitentiary,  when  Jim  and  Tom  and  Aleck, 

6 


QUITTING  SCHOOL  FOE  BUSINESS        9 

no  older  than  you,  have  left  Latin  and  math  and 
schoolroom  tyranny  behind  them  and  are  out  in  the 
world  leading  a  man's  life,  getting  a  man's  pay,  and 
urging  you  to  follow  their  example? 

If  the  other  fellows  keep  on  leaving,  and  the 
chances  to  make  money  keep  on  calling,  and  you  quit 
studying  and  keep  on  begging,  your  parents  will 
probably  give  way  and  let  you  leave  school.  So 
the  decision  is  really  up  to  you.  It  is  probably  the 
most  important  decision  you  have  ever  been  called 
upon  to  make.  You  stand  at  the  fork  of  your  life's 
highway.  Which  road  will  you  take?  The  first 
mile  or  two  of  the  non-trained,  non-educated  road  is, 
I  freely  admit,  very  attractive  just  now,  offering 
liberty,  novelty,  and  ready  money;  the  first  stages 
of  the  education-road  are  the  same  old  grind — 
tedious,  rocky,  uphill,  and  unattractive. 

Yet  remember,  it  is  the  whole  long  road,  through 
40,  50,  or  60  years,  you  are  now  choosing,  not  the 
first  few  miles  alone.  Your  boyhood's  choice  decides 
your  manhood's  destiny.  It  is  your  business,  there- 
fore, to  decide  this  question  like  a  man,  not  like  a 
boy.  The  child  looks  only  at  the  present,  the  man 
studies  the  future  also.  With  the  child,  present 
gratification  is  always  the  controlling  motive;  he 


10  YOUK  BIGGEST  JOB 

cannot  resist  attractive  bait,  however  sharp  and 
deadly  the  steel  hook  which  he  takes  with  it;  the 
now  and  the  here,  however  shallow  and  short-lived, 
always  prevail  with  him  over  the  long  future.  Be- 
fore you  exchange  trained  brains  and  educated  man- 
hood for  a  brief  boyhood  period  of  money-making, 
ponder  these  facts: 

1.  If  you  leave  school  and  enter  business  now, 
it  is  almost  certain  that  your  high  school  work  will 
never  be  resumed  or  completed. 

2.  With  this  decision  you,  therefore,  lose  your 
opportunity  of  college  training  and  of  entering  any  of 
the  great  professions.     Without  a  high  school  train- 
ing you  cannot  enter  any  college  or  university;  the 
doors  of  our  great  schools  of  Law,  Medicine,  Elec- 
trical, Civil,  and  Mechanical  Engineering,  Architec- 
ture, Industrial  Chemistry,  Commerce  and  Business 
Administration, — all  these,  and  other  great  openings 
like  them,  are  swung  shut  in  your  face. 

3.  You  thus  practically  throw  away  your  chance 
of  gaining  influence,  prominence,  and  leadership  in 
the  fierce  competition  of  twentieth-century  Amer- 
ican life,  which  is  too  complex  for  the  untrained  to 
understand,  far  less  to  lead. 

4.  For  the  sake  of  present  high  wages,  you  seari- 


QUITTING  SCHOOL  FOR  BUSINESS       11 

ously  diminish  your  income  for  all  the  long  years 
of  your  manhood.  In  the  mere  matter  of  income 
alone,  a  man's  earning  power  through  life  is  so 
increased  by  every  year  of  high-school  and  college 
training,  that  a  high  school  year  for  the  average 
boy  represents  nearly  $3,000  of  invested  capital;  a 
year  at  college  for  the  average  student  over  $5,000 ; 
while  for  the  student  who  stands  anywhere  near  the 
top  in  his  classes  these  figures  should  be  doubled. 

5.  You  will  also  serve  your  country  best  by 
training  yourself  for  the  great  work  of  the  next 
generation.  In  that  era  of  ferment  and  reconstruc- 
tion it  will  need  trained  men  far  more  than  it  now 
needs  the  services  of  untrained  boys.  Which  should 
you  offer  your  native  land  ?  Our  leading  statesmen, 
our  President,  the  Secretaries  of  the  Army  and  Navy, 
great  educators  and  business  leaders — all  urge  the 
boys  to  carry  on  their  school  and  college  work  for  the 
sake  of  their  country's  future. 

These  are  a  few  of  the  many  reasons  why  you 
should  resolutely  say  NO  to  the  call  of  temporary 
money-making,  make  a  man's  choice  for  a  man's 
future,  and  as  the  soldier  endures  the  monotonous 
drudgery  of  trench-training  for  the  sake  of  future 
victory,  be  enough  of  a  soldier  to  undergo  the  drudg- 


12  YOUE  BIGGEST  JOB 

ery  of  school  studies  for  the  sake  of  your  own 
future  success  and  leadership,  fired  by  the  certainty 
that  never  in  the  world's  history  has  education  been 
so  sure  to  pay  rich  dividends  as  during  your  life- 
time. 


CHAPTER  III 

GBINDSTONES:   A    STUDY   IN   TOOL-SHARPENING 

For  the  inspiration  and  encouragement  of  those 
who  find  the  schoolroom  a  prison  and  school- 
study  an  uphill  road. 

SOME  NATTJBAL  QUESTIONS 

As  a  red-blooded  boy  your  natural  longing  is  for 
liberty  and  adventure,  for  the  forest  and  the  river 
and  the  great  out-of-doors.  Yet  through  your  whole 
boyhood  you  are  held  a  prisoner  in  the  schoolroom, 
doomed  to  the  monotonous  routine  of  endless  study 
in  uninteresting  textbooks.  ~No  wonder  such  ques- 
tions as  these  arise  in  your  mind  and  fill  you  with 
restless  discontent: 

"Why  are  we  compelled  to  go  to  school  so  long?" 
"What's  the  good  of  learning  things  which  we'll 

forget  as  soon  as  we  leave  school?"    "Of  what  pos- 

13 


14  YOUR  BIGGEST  JOB 

sible  use  in  after  life  would  Latin  and  algebra  and 
geometry  be  to  me,  even  if  I  remembered  them?" 
"Why  do  they  select  for  our  school  course  studies 
that  are  so  uninteresting  and  so  hatefully  hard?" 
"If  I  spend  so  many  years  cooped  up  in  school 
getting  this  useless  knowledge,  won't  the  other  fel- 
lows get  so  far  ahead  of  me  in  business  that  I'll  stand 
no  chance  of  catching  up  ?" 

If  your  judgment  is  confused  and  your  will  weak- 
ened by  such  doubts  and  misgivings  as  these,  you 
cannot  be  either  a  happy  or  a  successful  student. 
As  an  elder  brother  who  has  not  only  traveled  the 
uphill  educational  road  before  you,  but  has  spent 
his  life  watching  the  success  and  failure  of  thou- 
sands ef  boys  in  your  circumstances,  I  will  try  to 
answer  every  one  of  them  by  this  lesson  on  Grind- 
stones. Study  it  till  the  answer  to  each  of  the  five 
questions  is  clear  and  plain. 

MAIC  A  TooL-TTsmo  AITCMAL 

The  club  and  spear  and  trap  of  the  savage  lift  him 
far  above  the  level  of  the  mightiest  beasts  which 
would  otherwise  soon  destroy  him.  As  civilization 
advances,  the  tools  invented  and  used  by  men  grow 


A  STUDY  IN  TOOIrSHAEPENING     15 

more  complex  and  powerful,  till  to-day  we  live  in  a 
world  of  machinery,  utilizing  the  giant  forces  of 
ooal  and  oil  and  gas,  of  steam  and  electricity  and 
rushing  waterfalls,  to  do  the  bidding  of  tiny  man. 

HlS    WOI'TDER-'WOBKING    ToOL-CnEST 

It  is  man's  Mind  alone  that  enables  him  to  invent, 
design,  and  manufacture  tools.  Every  locomotive 
and  steamship  and  aeroplane,  every  dredge  and  crane 
and' steam-shovel,  every  reaper  and  tractor  and  auto- 
truck, every  loom  and  lathe  and  engine,  is  a  product 
of  that  marvelous  collection  of  tools  known  as  the 
human  brain. 

Thus  every  normal  human  head  is  a  tool-box 
crammed  with  a  vast  assortment  of  wonder-working 
tools.  With  these  man  creates  the  engine-monsters 
that  do  his  work,  solves  the  problems  that  hinder  his 
advancement,  chains  the  forces  of  nature  to  do  his 
bidding,  and  reaps  for  himself  the  rewards  of 
wealth,  fame,  and  power. 

ITS  Oins  DEFBCT 

But  all  these  tools  as  furnished  him  by  nature 
are  desperately  dull.  They  are  infinite  in  number 


16  YOUE  BIGGEST  JOB 

and  variety,  of  a  marvelous  temper,  fitted  for  every 
human  use,  but  so  dull  that  the  ordinary  experi- 
ences of  life,  while  bringing  the  body  to  full-grown 
strength  and  vigor,  leave  the  mind  stupid  and  use- 
less for  expert  work.  If  a  crowd  of  full-grown 
savage  athletes  were  to  take  possession  of  a  modern 
city,  they  could  not  understand  its  problems  and 
processes,  utilize  its  conveniences,  or  keep  going  its 
marvelous  and  complicated  machinery.  To  do  these 
things  on  which  our  civilization  depends  the  various 
powers  of  the  mind  must  be  sharpened  by  a  long  and 
tedious  process  of  education. 

CrviLiZATioisr'8  GREATEST  TASK — THE  SHARPENING 
PROCESS 

Hence  every  civilized  nation  maintains  thousands 
of  shops,  called  schools,  where  the  work  of  sharpen- 
ing dull  brains  is  systematically  carried  on.  The 
various  studies  used  are  the  grindstones  and  thou- 
sands of  faithful  teachers  are  day  by  day  grinding 
to  a  cutting  edge  the  unsharpened  mental  powers  of 
countless  boys  and  girls. 


A  STUDY  IN"  TOOI^SHAKPESTISTG     17 

THE  TOOL-USEB'S  GEEATEST  MISTAKE 

Suppose  a  young  carpenter  inherits  a  magnificent 
box  of  tools,  of  finest  temper  and  infinite  variety, 
but  every  saw,  hatchet,  plane,  and  auger  hopelessly 
dull,  just  as  they  came  from  the  shaper.  Suppose,  as 
he  starts  on  a  lifetime  job  of  carpentering,  paid  for 
according  to  the  amount  and  quality  of  his  work, 
he  reasons  thus:  "Sharpening  all  these  diamond- 
hard  steel  tools  is  an  awfully  slow  and  tiresome  job, 
without  a  cent  of  pay.  I  want  to  be  drawing  wages 
for  carpenter  work,  not  wasting  precious  time  turn- 
ing grindstones." 

So  with  his  dull  tools  he  goes  to  work,  and  all  his 
life,  with  toil  and  sweat  and  added  hours  of  unsuc- 
cessful labor,  he  tries  in  vain  to  keep  up  with  hia 
competitors  who,  with  sharpened  tools,  so  easily 
outstrip  him. 

If  you  ventured  to  tell  him  the  plain  straight 
truth,  wouldn't  it  sound  like  this  ?  "You  silly,  short- 
sighted child!  Can't  you  see  that  the  tiresome 
grindstone-hours  are  really  the  best  paid  of  all; 
that  foolish  haste  then  makes  you  slow  all  the  rest 
of  your  life;  that  the  best  way  to  lighten  your  toil, 


18  YOUR  BIGGEST  JOB 

improve  your  work,  increase  your  pay,  and  add  to 
your  happiness  all  your  life  long  is  to  sharpen  your 
tools  before  going  to  work,  however  hard  and  tedious 
the  job  may  be  ?" 

THE  MIND-USER'S  GREATEST  MISTAKE 

This  is  the  age  of  steam  and  steel  and  machinery, 
and,  therefore,  preeminently  the  age  of  mind.  To 
put  a  cutting  edge  on  its  wonderful  and  varied  as- 
sortment of  powers  is  necessarily  a  long  and  tedious 
job,  yet  of  all  your  investments  of  time  and  toil 
and  money,  none  pay  such  certain  and  enormous 
dividends.  Life  gives  you  but  one  grindstone 
period.  Be  wise,  therefore,  in  time.  To  do  your 
lifework  in  the  world  with  a  dull,  slow,  ignorant, 
untrained  mind  because  you  were  too  hasty  and 
short-sighted  and  weak-willed  to  train  its  powers 
during  the  sharpening  period  is  the  worst  mistake 
a  mind-user  can  make. 

GRINDSTONES  MUST  BE  HARD 

When  the  harsh  grit  of  a  revolving  stone  begins 
to  put  an  edge  on  a  steel  ax,  it  might,  if  ignorant 


A  STUDY  IN  TOOI^SHAEPENING     19 

and  inexperienced,  cry  out  against  the  hardness  and 
harshness  of  the  stone,  and  beg  to  have  it  covered 
•with  velvet  and  thus  made  smooth  and  pleasant. 

How  would  you  answer  such  a  plea?  "You  fool- 
ish ax!  Canton  flannel  and  velvet  will  never  put 
an  edge  on  steel.  A  grindstone  must  be  hard  and 
gritty  or  it's  of  no  use.  If  you  stop  the  scratching 
and  grinding,  you  stop  the  sharpening." 

So  with  your  studies. — Soft,  easy,  velvet  studies 
will  never  put  a  cutting  edge  on  your  headful  of  dull 
tools.  The  harder  your  lesson  is  and  the  harder 
you  press  your  mind  against  it,  and  the  more  swiftly 
and  diligently  the  teacher  pushes  the  grinding  pro- 
cess, the  more  rapidly  and  perfectly  are  your  mental 
powers  being  sharpened.  Hard  studies,  therefore, 
are  your  best  friends.  A  "dirt-easy"  study  is  not  a 
grindstone  at  all. 

GOOD  GBINDING-STONES  ARE  FEW 

After  millions  of  experiments  through  thousands 
of  years  with  all  kinds  of  rocks,  every  tool-using 
nation  on  the  globe  has  decided  on  sandstone  in  its 
various  forms  as  the  only  natural  rock  suitable  for 
grindstones  and  whetstones.  No  carpenter  would 


20  YOUK  BIGGEST  JOB 

nowadays  be  so  foolish  as  to  reject  the  wisdom  born 
of  such  long  experience  and  ruin  his  fine  tools  by 
using  granite,  or  brickbats,  or  marble. 

So  with  your  school  studies.  If  you  and  your 
fellow  Solomons  of  the  playground  are  tempted  to 
declare  that  algebra  and  geometry  are  "no  good," 
and  foreign  languages  and  physics  and  history  a 
foolish  waste  of  time,  and  those  who  arranged  your 
high  school  curriculum  a  set  of  hopeless  old  fogies, 
stop  a  moment  and  reflect.  In  England  and  France 
and  Italy,  in  Canada  and  the  United  States  and 
Australia,  in  Japan  and  India  and  Egypt  and  South 
America,  the  high  schools  are  using  those  very  grind- 
stones in  their  business  of  sharpening  young  people's 
brains.  Surely  it  is  a  little  rash  and  foolish  to  put 
your  boy-opinion  against  the  judgment  of  a  million 
professional  experts.  Maybe  it  would  be  wiser  to 
complain  less  and  study  more. 

LEAVING  THE  GRINDSTONES  BEHIND 

Does  a  carpenter  going  out  to  work  carry  with 
him  an  armful  of  grindstones  ?  By  no  means.  Their 
work  is  dona  Their  value  is  now  found  in  the 
sharpness  of  the  tools  and  speeds  up  all  his  work, 


A  STUDY  IN  TOOL-SHAKPENING     21 

but  the  grindstones  themselves  are  of  no  further 
use. 

So  with  these  "unpractical,"  "useless"  studies. 
Suppose  you  do  forget  your  Latin  and  algebra 
and  French  and  geometry.  That  need  not  trouble 
you.  Their  work  was  done  in  the  schoolroom.  You 
may  leave  them  there  without  regret  and  use  your 
trained  powers  all  your  life  on  your  grown-up  tasks, 
rejoicing  in  this  inspiring  truth,  that  mind,  unlike 
lifeless  steel,  grows  sharper  and  sharper  the  more 
you  use  it 


CHAPTEE  IV 

A  NEGLECTED  ART 

A  word  of  counsel  to  American  lays  about  their  first 
big  job. 

THE  VALUE  OF  "KNOWING  How" 

Whatever  your  job  may  be,  whether  raising  crops, 
selling  goods,  building  houses,  or  healing  sick  folks, 
the  secret  of  success  is  to  "know  how."  To  be  igno- 
rant of  your  job  is  to  be  slow,  uncertain,  clumsy,  and 
unsuccessful.  To  know  how  is  to  work  wisely, 
swiftly,  happily,  and  of  course  successfully. 

YOUE  CHIEF  BUSINESS 

The  American  boy  is  always  busy.  His  life  is  an 
unbroken  series  of  enthusiasms — marbles  and  sleds 

22 


A  NEGLECTED  AET  23 

and  ponies,  skates  and  guns  and  fishing  tackle,  base- 
ball and  football  and  amateur  photography,  sweet- 
hearts and  frat-halls  and  college  politics  and  amateur 
business  ventures — they  swing  by  in  endless  and 
inspiring  succession  while  the  swift  years  keep 
changing  his  size,  his  clothes,  his  habits,  his  friends, 
his  amusements,  his  aims  in  life,  and  often  his 
place  of  residence  and  whole  environment. 

Yet  through  it  all,  day  by  day,  month  by  month, 
year  by  year,  the  great  business  of  study  goes  stead- 
ily on.  It  begins  with  the  childish  prattle  of  the 
kindergarten,  and  grows  constantly  harder  and  more 
exacting  through  the  long  years  of  the  graded 
school,  the  severer  tasks  of  the  high  school,  the  inten- 
sive training  of  the  college,  the  concentrated  labors 
of  the  professional  school.  Surely  no  one  can  deny 
that  the  chief  business,  the  regular  profession,  of 
the  American  "boy  is  STUDYING,  getting  "knowl- 
edge out  of  books,  acquiring  what  we  call  "an  edvr 
cation." 

THE  EEWAEDS  OF  SUCCESS 

In  these  hundreds  of  books  are  hidden  the  secrets 
of  human  progress,  the  treasures  of  human  knowl- 


24  YOUR  BIGGEST  JOB 

edge,  the  art  and  science  and  literature  and  moral 
wisdom  of  the  whole  race.  The  successful  student 
finds  all  human  enterprises,  professions,  and  oppor- 
tunities open  to  him.  His  trained  mind  learns  the 
secrets  and  wields  the  forces  of  this  marvelous  age 
of  steam  and  steel  and  electricity.  By  thus  enrich- 
ing his  earlier  years  with  the  accumulated  knowledge 
of  all  time  he  crowns  the  vigor  and  freshness  of 
youth  with  a  skill  and  wisdom  otherwise  associated 
only  with  long  experience  and  the  infirmities  of  ad- 
vanced age.  Successful  study,  therefore,  opens  wide 
the  gate  to  power,  usefulness,  wealth,  and  fame. 

THE  PENALTIES  OF  FAILURE 

If,  on  the  other  hand,  an  American  boy  either 
cannot  or  will  not  obtain  an  education,  he  finds  him- 
self seriously  crippled  in  the  race  for  success  and 
distinction,  and  must  generally  be  content  with 
simple  tasks  and  subordinate  positions.  The  great 
professions  of  our  complex  civilization,  and  most 
of  the  high  places  of  influence  and  service,  are  hope- 
lessly out  of  reach  of  those  who  "do  not  know  how 
to  study" 


A  NEGLECTED  AKT  25 

A  NEGLECTED  ABT 

Since  such  vital  issues  are  at  stake,  one  would 
suppose  that  every  school  and  college  would  give 
lessons  in  the  art  of  study,  and  that  every  boy  and 
girl  facing  the  long  task  would  earnestly  seek  to 
<fknow  how." 

Yet  just  the  opposite  is  the  case.  Millions  of  our 
young  people  are  left  to  blunder  along  and  try  to 
find  out  for  themselves.  No  wonder  so  many  fail 
and  drop  out.  No  one  would  think  of  following 
such  a  course  with  young  musicians,  or  carpenters, 
or  gardeners. 

It  is  like  throwing  multitudes  into  deep  water  and 
letting  each  find  out  for  himself  how  to  swim. 
Some  in  their  blind  struggles  will  hit  upon  a  more 
or  less  correct  stroke  and  reach  shore.  The  ma- 
jority, working  just  as  hard,  will  go  under  because 
no  one  has  taught  them  how.  A  few  lessons  in  the 
art  of  swimming  would  often  transform  such  hope- 
less and  fatiguing  struggles  into  swift  and  joyful 
progress.  Even  a  few  hints  from  an  expert  may  at 
once  double  the  speed  and  wind  of  a  hard-working 
but  untaught  swimmer. 


26  YOUR  BIGGEST  JOB 

THE  PURPOSE  OF  THIS  CHAPTER 

The  purpose  of  this  chapter  is  to  awaken  your 
interest,  fire  your  heart,  and  stiffen  your  backbone 
into  a  resolute  determination  not  to  blunder  and 
flounder  any  longer,  but  to  become  a  master  of  the 
art  of  study. 

If  with  the  right  spirit  you  use  the  right  methods, 
you  can  get  your  lessons  in  half  the  time  and  thus 
nave  more  leisure  for  home  duties  or  outside  sports. 
Your  studies  will  all  grow  easier  and  you  will  rise 
from  your  tasks  fresh  and  confident.  You  will 
acquire  the  habit  of  success  and  will  gain  in  reputa- 
tion and  self-respect.  You  and  your  teachers  will 
both  conclude  that  you  have  more  brains  than  you 
were  formerly  credited  with,  and  all  the  long  years 
of  your  school  and  college  life  will  be  made  happier 
and  more  fruitful. 

Then  why  not  try?  Get  advice  from  your  teach- 
ers. Learn  the  methods  of  more  successful  students. 
Vary  your  own  methods  of  study.  Find  out  what 
are  your  faults  and  weaknesses  as  a  student  and  be 
man  enough  to  correct  them.  Stop  dodging  work 
and  hunting  up  excuses  and  finding  fault  with  your 
teachers.  Quit  taking  the  others  fellow's  dust  on 


A  NEGLECTED  ART  27 

the  highway  of  learning.  Turn  on  more  gasoline 
and  travel  on  high  gear.  Some  day,  in  some  later 
profession  in  life,  you  expect  to  shine  as  a  big  suc- 
cess. Why  not  hegin  now  in  your  present  profession 
and  get  the  habit  early  ? 


CHAPTER  V 

THE  KEY  TO  SUCCESS  IN  STUDY 

Some  practical  suggestions  which  will  make  hard 
lessons  easy  and  double  a  student's  hours  of 
leisure. 

If  you  <{know  how  to  study,"  you  can  make  your- 
self an  expert  in  almost  any  department  of  human 
activity.  The  accumulated  knowledge  and  experi- 
ence of  the  whole  race  is  at  your  disposal.  You  can 
utilize  for  your  own  tasks  the  stored  power  of  all 
past  generations. 

If,  however,  you  "cannot  learn  things  out  of 
books,"  you  will  remain  all  your  life  ignorant,  nar- 
row, undeveloped,  a  hopeless  cripple  in  the  eager 
race  for  life's  prizes. 

How  then  can  you  learn  this  wonder-working  art  ? 
Here  is  the  great  underlying  primal  secret  of  all 
successful  study.  If  you  are  wise  enough  and 

28 


THE  KEY  TO  SUCCESS  IN  STUDY       29 

strong  enough  to  make  it  yours,  every  word  is  worth 
a  ten-carat  diamond. 

LEARN  TO  STUDY  ALWAYS  WITH 
WHITE-HOT  CONCENTRATION. 

Welding  new  ideas  on  a  cold  mind  is  as  impossible 
as  welding  new  pieces  on  cold  iron.  No  amount  of 
hammering  will  make  them  stick.  An  inattentive 
mind  cannot  absorb  or  retain  new  ideas.  A  half- 
interested  cold-hearted  player  will  never  make  the 
varsity  team,  though  he  spend  a  thousand  hours  on 
the  athletic  field.  Neither  will  a  half-interested 
cold-hearted  student  ever  make  a  success  of  study, 
though  he  spend  endless  hours  holding  a  book  or 
reading  over  his  lessons. 

Studying  with  intense  attention  soon  develops  a 
menial  power  hitnerto  undreamed  of.  In  the  glow- 
ing heat  of  a  white-hot  mind  "hard"  lessons  become 
soft,  long  lessons  become  short,  and  the  hours  form- 
erly spent  in  slow  study  are  released  for  leisure  or 
outside  activities.  The  habit  of  concentration  not 
only  makes  you  a  successful  student  but  is  the  secret 
of  power  and  leadership  in  all  the  problems  and 
activities  of  your  later  life. 

But  all  life's  good  things,  must  be  earned.  Power 
is  a  growth  from  within,  not  a  gift  from  without. 


30  YOTJK  BIGGEST  JOB 

Strength  of  mind  as  of  body  comes  only  from 
strenuous  exercise,  and  beginners  must  expect  fatigue 
and  soreness. 

When,  however,  by  hard  work  and  resolute  deter- 
mination, you  have  established  the  habit  of  swift 
intensive  study,  you  will  feel  like  a  traveler  who  has 
stepped  from  a  farm  wagon  into  a  high-powered 
car. 

Here  are  some  practical  methods  of  developing 
this  wonder-working  power. 

FIEST  :    MAKE  YOTJB  SURROUNDINGS  FAVOEABLE  TO 
CONCENTRATION 

A  thoroughly  trained  mind  can  isolate  itself  and 
study  in  a  boiler  factory  or  a  cheering  grandstand. 
Beginners,  however,  should  be  free  from  anything 
which  can  divide  or  divert  their  attention.  While 
studying  you  should  see  nothing  else,  hear  nothing 
else,  think  of  nothing  else.  Your  whole  mind  should 
be  driven  like  a  blast  of  white-hot  flame  into  your 
subject  and  held  there  till  it  has  been  fused  and  ab- 
sorbed. Even  winter  sunlight,  not  warm  enough  to 
sunburn  a  baby's  cheek,  if  gathered  by  a  lens  to  a 
single  point,  will  set  the  most  stubborn  materials 


THE  KEY  TO  SUCCESS  IN  STUDY       31 

on  fire.  So  even  a  moderately  powerful  mind,  if  its 
whole  undivided  strength  be  focused  by  strong  will- 
power on  one  subject  and  held  there,  can  accomplish 
results  usually  attributed  to  genius.  Such  concen- 
tration is  impossible  if  part  of  your  mind  is  follow- 
ing a  phonograph  tune,  noticing  outside  noises,  or 
becoming  interested  every  now  and  then  in  conver- 
sation. 

If,  therefore,  your  surroundings  during  study 
hours  are  such  that  you  cannot  practice  such  concen- 
tration as  I  have  described  and  you  are  unable  to 
change  them,  have  wisdom  and  backbone  enough  to 
seek  a  new  and  more  favorable  location. 

SECOND:  INVENT  AND  ADOPT  METHODS  OF  STIMU- 
LATING YOUR  CONCENTRATION 

a.  Study  in  Competition  with  Others.  —  The 
fighting  instinct  is  a  powerful  stimulant.  In  such 
friendly  contests  over  grades,  honors,  punctuality- 
records,  etc.,  both  contestants  are  prize  winners  if 
both  have  done  their  best. 

6.  Study  against  Time. — This  is  an  admirable 
method  of  stimulating  concentration.  With  your 
open  watch  before  you  assign  so  many  minutes  to 


32  YOUR  BIGGEST  JOB 

a  given  page  or  paragraph.  During  that  period 
keep  every  faculty  absorbed  in  the  task.  Then,  with 
your  eyes  shut,  test  your  success  by  repeating  each 
item. 

c.  Try  Overnight  Memorizing. — Just  before  go- 
ing to  bed  read  a  verse  or  paragraph  once,  very 
slowly,  with  intense  attention.    As  soon  as  you  wake 
next    morning,    make    a    persistent    long-continued 
effort  to  recall  every  word.    A  few  minutes  so  spent 
every  day,  steadily  lengthening  your  selections,  will 
soon  double  the  accuracy  and  retentiveness  of  your 
memory,  and  make  all  "reading  studies"  easy. 

d.  Try  the  "S7wt-eye"  Method  of  Study.— Nearly 
all  young  students  use  their  eyes  a  great  deal  and 
theii  minds  very  little.    AV  least  ten  thousand  injure 
their  eyes  by  incessant  or  unwise  use  to  every  one 
who  suffers  from  mind-strain.    Study  a  paragraph  or 
chapter   intensely   a   certain   number   of   minutes: 
then  spend  exactly  the  same  number  of  minutes  with 
your  eyes  shut  recalling,  reviewing,  and  repeating 
it.     As  a  mind  exercise  the  second  period  is  far 
more  valuable  than  the  first. 

e.  And  Finally,  Imitate  the  Great  Teacher  LIFE. — 
Try  on  yourself  a  mercilessly  applied  system  of  re- 
wards and  punishments.    Suppose  every  tardy  rising 


THE  KEY  TO  SUCCESS  IN  STUDY      33 

cuts  off  your  breakfast-butter,  and  every  failure  in 
class  your  next  dessert.  Suppose  there  can  be  no 
picture  snow  or  night  entertainment  if  any  written 
work  is  due  but  not  completed,  while  the  winning 
of  certain  grades  or  honors  is  rewarded  by  a  coveted 
indulgence  or  a  week-end  trip.  This  is  the  method 
by  which  the  great  school  of  life  keeps  countless 
millions  eagerly  at  work.  It  is  the  world  tonic  for 
laziness  and  indifference.  Give  it  a  thorough  trial, 
with  yourself  as  patient,  and  watch  the  effect  on 
your  mental  vigor. 

THIRD  :     LEARN  TO  CONCENTRATE  YOUR  ATTENTION 
ON  A  SUBJECT  AS  A  MATTER  OF  WILL-POWER 

Do  not  consider  its  intrinsic  interest  or  attractive- 
ness. Until  you  can  do  this,  you  have  still  the  un- 
trained mind  of  a  child,  whatever  may  be  your  age, 
height,  or  appearance.  In  fact  the  ability  to  direct 
and  control  the  attention  is  not  only  the  chief  end 
of  all  education  but  its  most  accurate  measure.  It 
is  the  infallible  mark  of  mental  maturity,  the  step- 
ping stone  to  intellectual  power,  the  surest  guaran- 
tee of  future  success. 

For  a  student  to  refuse  to  learn  a  lesson  because 


34:  YOUR  BIGGEST  JOB 

lie  "doesn't  find  it  interesting"  is  as  childishly  ab- 
surd as  for  physicians  and  architects  and  lawyers 
to  refuse  their  tasks  for  the  same  reason.  Let  such 
conduct  be  confined  to  the  age  of  long  curls  and 
pinafores.  To  master  a  distasteful  study  by  sheer 
will-power  is  the  most  valuable  exercise  in  your 
whole  school  course. 


CHAPTER  VI 

A   WIDESPREAD    FALLACY   DISPROVED 

A  warning  to  inexperienced  travelers  on  life's  high- 
way against  false  sign-boards. 

LYING  PKOVEKBS 

The  proverbs  or  maxims  of  a  people  generally 
represent  the  wisdom  of  long  experience.  They  are 
sign-boards  on  life's  great  highway  erected  by 
former  generations,  and  most  travelers  accept  their 
guidance  without  question.  As  a  false  sign  on  a 
crowded  roadway  may  lead  multitudes  astray,  so  an 
untrue  maxim,  especially  when  circulating  among 
the  young  and  inexperienced,  may  turn  countless 
lives  into  dangerous  or  fatal  paths.  "Every  young 
man  must  sow  his  wild  oats,"  "All's  fair  in  love  and 
war,"  "Every  man  has  his  price,"  are  examples  of 
such  lying  proverbs. 

35 


36  YOUB  BIGGEST  JOB 

Our  boys  and  girls,  inexperienced  travelers  on  a 
new  road,  eager  to  be  in  the  fashion,  untaught  as  yet 
by  hard  experience,  are  easily  misled  by  current 
fallacies  and  false  traditions,  especially  if  the  false- 
hood is  sugar-coated  with  a  little  truth  and  its  accept- 
ance furnishes  a  ready  excuse  for  laziness  or  mis- 
conduct. 

To  this  doubly  dangerous  class  belongs  the  oft- 
repeated  and  widely-believed  statement  that  the  boy 
who  leads  his  class  in  school  is  generally  a  failure  in 
after  life.  Here  is  the  lying  tradition  sweetened  with 
a  little  truth  and  flavored  with  counterfeit  logic: 

( 
THE  FALLACY  STATED 

"To  attain  success  in  the  fierce  warfare  of  modern 
business  demands  pluck,  self-confidence,  red-blooded 
vitality,  and  a  knowledge  of  men  and  things,  rather 
than  'book-learning*  and  abstract  scholarship.  In 
fact,  the  students  who  make  the  very  highest  grades 
are  not  so  apt  to  win  promotion  and  success  in  later 
life  as  their  wiser  comrades  who  refuse  to  spend 
more  time  in  study  than  is  necessary  to  make  rea- 
sonably fair  grades,  and  are  thereby  enabled  to  par- 


A  FALLACY  DISPROVED  37 

ticipate  more  vigorously  in  the  social  and  athletic 
activities  of  the  playground  and  campus." 

To  the  lazy  and  self-indulgent,  to  social  dudes  and 
tin-horn  sports  and  overgrown  children,  to  all  who 
long  to  study  less  and  play  more,  this  theory  is  as 
fascinating  as  poisoned  candy  in  a  kindergarten. 
It  not  only  excuses  neglect  of  duty  but  crowns  the 
loafer  as  a  man  of  far-seeing  wisdom.  It  is  a  timely 
opiate  when  conscience  stirs  within,  a  trusty  armor 
when  parents  and  teachers  assail  from  without. 

What  wonder  that  in  many  student  circles  it  is  the 
most  unquestioned  part  of  the  school  creed  and 
campus  opinion  looks  down  with  mingled  pity  and 
contempt  on  "studes,"  "digs,"  "grinds,"  and  "schol- 
arship cranks." 

The  truth  is  that  those  who  outstrip  their  indo- 
lent or  brainless  competitors  in  school  or  college 
continue  to  do  so  when  school  days  are  over,  and 
to  win  high  scholarship  honors  in  a  first-class  col- 
lege is  almost  a  guarantee  of  success  in  life. 

THE  FALLACY  DISPEOVED 

To  prove  this  let  us  take  only  one  of  many  im- 
partial investigations. 


38  YOUR  BIGGEST  JOB 

In  1911,  Dr.  Paul  Van  Dyke  made  a  careful  study 
of  the  scholarship  records  and  future  history  of 
nearly  9,000  graduates  of  five  typical  colleges  to 
see  how  many  of  them  had  attained  such  prominence 
as  to  be  placed  in  the  Who's  Who  list  of  distin- 
guished Americans,  published  every  other  year  by 
Marquis  and  Company,  of  Chicago.  Other  similar 
studies  had  shown  that  of  the  two  million  Americans 
who  never  attended  school,  none  attained  the  Who's 
Who  list ;  of  those  with  a  common  school  education, 
it  took  9,000  to  furnish  one  distinguished  man;  of 
those  with  high  school  training,  one  in  400  reached 
eminence;  of  all  college  students,  one  in  40;  of  all 
college  graduates,  about  one  in  15. 

Dr.  Van  Dyke's  study  of  the  Harvard  records 
covered  thirteen  successive  senior  classes,  numbering 
2,229  men,  of  whom  only  75  won  the  very  highest 
scholarship  honors.  Of  these  75,  59  were  living  in 
1911,  and  27  of  them  were  listed  in  Who's  Who  of 
that  year,  about  1  in  2. 

At  Yale,  twenty  senior  classes  numbered  2,132, 
with  102  first-honor  men,  of  whom  the  80  living  in 
1911  furnished  31  to  the  Who's  Who  list 

Princeton's    seniors    for    20    years,    numbering 


39 

1,687,  furnished  100  honor-men.  Of  these  76  were 
living  in  1911,  with  29  in  Who's  Who. 

Amherst  College  in  17  years  furnished  1,153 
seniors  and  106  honor-men.  Of  the  80  living  in 
1911,  25  had  reached  distinction. 

Brown  University  in  15  years  had  778  seniors, 
of  whom  60  won  first-honor.  Of  these  there  were  53 
living  in  1911,  and  19  were  listed  in  Who's  Who. 

Thus  among  7,979  men,  having  all  the  advantages 
of  modern  college  training,  representing  five  institu- 
tions and  eighty-five  graduating  classes,  348  (4  per 
cent)  were  differentiated  from  the  rest  solely  hy 
their  very  high  grades.  While  this  group  was  still 
below  middle  age,  and  79  of  them  too  young  to  have 
had  a  fair  chance  to  win  distinction,  131  (1  in  every 
2f)  had  already  won  a  place  on  the  Who's  Who 
list  of  distinguished  men  which  contains  only  one 
fifty-fifth  of  one  per  cent  of  the  total  population. 
Omitting  the  79,  one  half  of  the  remainder  were  al- 
ready on  the  "Who's  Who"  list  in  1911. 

FEOM  ANOTHER  VIEWPOINT 

To  sum  it  up  from  another  point  of  view:  The 
man  who  graduates  with  high  scholastic  honors,  in- 


40  YOUR  BIGGEST  JOB 

stead  of  being  unfitted  for  success  by  his  extra 
"book-learning,"  is  about  seven  times  as  likely  to 
become  a  distinguished  man  as  the  "all-round  men" 
taking  their  diplomas  with  him.  As  compared  with 
the  average  college  student  his  chances  are  20  to  1 ; 
compared  with  the  average  high  school  student  200 
to  1;  and  with  those  having  only  a  common  school 
education  5,000  to  1.  In  this  Age  of  Mind  as  never 
before,  Knowledge  is  Power,  and  the  man  who 
knows  is  the  man  who  leads. 

The  next  time,  therefore,  the  silly  falsehood  that 
star  students  generally  fail  in  business  threatens  to 
become  epidemic  on  your  campus,  kindly  inoculate 
the  "easy  marks"  with  the  above  facts  and  arrest  the 
spread  of  the  contagion. 


CHAPTER  YII 

ON  GETTING  EICH 

For  the  consideration  of  the  ambitious  American 
T)oy  who  is  tired  of  boolcs,  bent  on  win- 
ning wealth  and  business  leadership,  and  be- 
ginning to  believe  that  American  hustle  and  an 
early  start  will  enable  him  to  reach  his  goal 
more  quickly  than  book-learning  and  a  college 
diploma. 

A  LAUDABLE  AMBITION 

I  don't  blame  a  boy  for  wanting  to  get  rich  when 
he  grows  up  and  enters  business.  Next  to  character 
and  wisdom,  money  is  probably  the  greatest  earthly 
blessing.  It  is  like  coal,  gasoline,  or  dynamite,  dead 
and  useless  in  itself,  and  dangerous  if  misused,  but 
always  brimful  of  concentrated  power.  Rightly 
used,  wealth  not  only  gives  to  its  possessor  comfort, 

41 


42  YOUB  BIGGEST  JOB 

health,  culture,  and  happiness,  but  enables  him  to 
bestow  all  these  blessings  on  others.  All  of  us,  there- 
fore, will  agree  that  to  get  rich  safely,  honestly,  and 
rapidly  is  a  laudable  ambition  for  young  Americans 
looking  forward  to  a  business  life. 

Aisr  IMPORTANT  QUESTION 

The  far  more  practical  and  perplexing  question 
for  you  is  "By  what  route  can  I  best  reach  that 
shining  goal?"  There  are  countless  competitors 
trying  to  beat  you  to  it,  a  wilderness  of  roads 
and  trails  to  choose  from,  a  Babel  of  advice  from 
without,  a  warfare  of  inclinations  within,  a  multi- 
tude of  failures  on  every  side,  and  small  hope  of 
correcting  early  mistakes.  Certain  very  tempting 
shortcuts  will  infallibly  land  you  in  the  sanitarium, 
the  poorhouse,  or  the  penitentiary.  Some  of  the 
most  popular  roads,  thronged  with  eager  and  hope- 
ful runners,  start  out  like  city  boulevards,  but  will 
soon  slow  you  down  in  endless  mud,  doomed  for  the 
rest  of  your  days  to  low  gear  and  high  horsepower. 
No  wonder  a  young  and  inexperienced  traveler  id 
perplexed. 


ON  GETTING  KICH  43 

Two  FATAL  MISTAKES 

Since  I  have  spent  my  whole  life  watching  the 
successes  and  failures  of  thousands  of  young  Ameri- 
cans, let  me  warn  you  of  two  fundamental  mistakes 
which  are  responsible  for  more  failures  in  business 
than  all  others  combined.  One  is  a  question  of 
character,  the  other  of  education.  Both  must  be 
settled  in  boyhood,  and  a  wrong  decision  of  either 
question  cannot  be  undone  by  a  lifetime  of  later 
regrets. 

The  First  Mistake  is  to  believe  that  in  the  world 
of  practical  business  trickery  and  underhand  deal- 
ing will  hasten  the  attainment  of  wealth  and  busi- 
ness leadership.  Of  course  they  may  increase  the 
profits  of  a  single  deal,  but  modern  business  is  so 
based  on  mutual  confidence  and  so  quick  to  detect 
unreliability  that  crooked  dealing  will  inevitably 
cripple  you  in  the  race  for  "big  business."  The  dis- 
honest business  man  of  to-day  is  not  only  a  knave  but 
a  suicidal  fool. 

The  Second  Mistake  is  far  more  widespread  and 
has  ruined  more  business  careers  than  all  other 
errors  combined.  It  is  to  abandon  your  education. 


44  YOUE  BIGGEST  JOB 

at  an  early  stage  and  enter  business  under  the  influ- 
ence of  such  statements  as  the  following: 

"A  lot  of  book-learning  generally  unfits  a  man  for 
practical  business."  "The  men  who  make  the  high- 
est grades  in  school  or  college  are  not  often  success- 
ful in  real  life."  "High  school  and  college  studies, 
even  if  one  remembered  them  in  after  life,  are  too 
useless  and  impractical  to  be  of  any  real  help  in  sell- 
ing goods,  managing  a  store,  or  running  any  kind  of 
actual  business."  "It  takes  an  early  start,  practical 
common  sense,  and  American  hustle  to  make  money, 
not  years  of  book-learning  and  a  college  diploma." 

Every  one  of  these  statements  is  a  falsehood.  Yet 
to  the  ignorant  boy  tired  of  study  they  are  as  danger- 
ously attractive  as  that  other  poisonous  falsehood, 
that  every  young  man  must  sow  his  wild  oats,  is  to  the 
boy  who  is  tired  of  being  good.  If  your  determina- 
tion to  be  an  educated  man  is  growing  weaker  under 
their  influence,  weigh  well  the  following  suggestions : 

1.  Don't  let  your  desire  influence  your  judgment. 
The  fact  that  you  want  to  believe  these  lies  and  act 
accordingly  doesn't  make  them  tru  Because  a 
freezing  man  hates  to  move  on,  and  eagerly  accepts 
anybody's  advice  to  take  a  nap  first,  is  no  sign  that 
such  a  course  is  wise. 


ON  GETTING  EICH  45 

2.  In  trying  to  determine  the  value  of  an  education 
'as  an  aid  to  wealth  and  business  leadership,  don't 
accept  the  opinions  of  uneducated  business  men.  Yon 
might  as  well  get  a  blind  man's  help  in  deciding  on 
color  combinations  or  consult  a  Hindoo  as  to  the 
merits  of  American  baseball.     Who  are  circulating 
these  statements  about  book-learning  being  "no  good" 
in  actual  business?     Nine-tenths  of  them  are  half- 
baked  clerks  and  soda-fountain  dispensers,  untrained 
men  of  the  "little-business"  class,  and  school-boy  phil- 
osophers of  the  "fool-kid"  variety.    If  you  want  big 
advice  about  big  business,  go  to  big  men  who  have 
both  education  and  leadership,  not  to  these  "experts" 
of  the  street-corner  and  the  playground  who  have 
neither. 

3.  Don't  think  you  can  coin  mere  physical  strength 
and  bodily  labor  into  riches,  or  even  into  moderate 
wealth  and  comfort.    Even  the  horse  is  being  driven 
off  the  field  by  modern  machinery.    Human  muscles 
stand  no  show  in  this  age  of  steam  and  steel.    One  de- 
cision of  a  trained  mind  will  often  earn  more  money 
than  a  whole  year,  or  even  a  lifetime,  of  exhausting 
bodily  labor. 

4.  Don't  overrate  mere  "hustle"  as  a  money-maker. 
Tireless,  sleepless,  red-hot  bodily  activity  is  a  great 


46  YOUH  BIGGEST  JOB 

aid  to  success,  especially  in  subordinate  positions,  but 
it  belongs  especially  to  youth,  and  if  it  is  your  sole 
dependence,  younger  competitors  will  soon  hustle  you 
off  the  race-track.  You  want  the  long  years  after 
forty  to  be  the  richest  and  most  fruitful  of  your  whole 
business  career. 

There  must  be  some  way  to  accomplish  such  a  re- 
sult, for,  even  in  the  recent  tempestuous  era  of  world- 
wide war,  the  leading  generals,  statesmen,  and  admin- 
istrators in  every  land  were  nearly  all  gray-headed. 

THE  SECRET  OF  LEADERSHIP 

And  this  brings  us  to  the  root  and  fruit  of  the 
whole  discussion.  The  key  to  leadership,  to  business 
success  on  a  large  scale,  to  the  organization  and  man- 
agement of  complex  industrial  enterprises,  to  the 
fabulous  riches  of  new  discoveries  and  successful  in- 
ventions, to  the  control  and  utilization  of  Nature's 
giant  forces ;  to  the  triumph  of  human  skill  over  earth 
and  air  and  water,  over  fire  and  flood  and  famine, 
over  vice  and  disease  and  poverty;  to  that  kind  of 
ability  that  grows  more  productive  and  remunera- 
tive with  advancing  years — the  one  golden  key 


ON  GETTING  RICH  47 

which  opens  almost  every  door  to  human  hope  and 
human  achievement  is 


TRAINED  BRAINS 

This  is  the  Age  of  Mind,  of  the  expert  and  the 
specialist,  of  the  efficient  engineer  and  the  trained 
administrator.  Against  such  competition  the  unedu- 
cated man  is  like  an  Indian  warrior  with  his  toma- 
hawk against  a  modern  soldier  and  his  repeating  rifle. 

If  you  who  read  this  message  are  fortunate  enough 
to  possess  both  Brains  and  a  Backbone,  recognize  this 
momentous  fact  with  the  first,  apply  it  to  your  own 
training  with  the  second,  and  you  will  have  already 
taken,  even  in  boyhood,  two  long  steps  toward  future 
business  leadership. 

This  chapter  deals  with  fundamental  principles. 
In  the  next  I  hope  to  give  some  detailed  and  exact 
facts  as  to  the  money-value  of  book-learning. 


CHAPTER  YIII 

THE   CASH   VALUE   OF   BOOK   LEARNING 

A  few  hard  facts  for  the  schoolboy  who  asks  the  ques- 
tion: Do  High  School  Studies  Pay?  and  for 
the  parent  who  finds  it  hard  to  see  any  connec- 
tion between  book-learning  and  money-making. 

YOUB  BIGGEST  QUESTION 

If,  when  your  school  days  are  over  and  you  enter 
the  fierce  competitive  struggle  of  business  life,  you 
find  yourself  unable  to  "make  a  good  living,"  you'll 
be  miserable.  So  will  your  wife  and  children. 

Yet  you  are  urged  by  your  teachers  to  spend  your 
whole  boyhood — your  one  period  of  preparation — 
studying  textbooks  which  have  nothing  to  do  with 
business. 

No  wonder  you  are  puzzled.  Culture  may  be  very 
nice,  but  poverty  is  not;  and  if  all  these  years  of 

4« 


book-learning  are  using  up  your  youth  without  fitting 
you  for  business  success,  the  sooner  you  quit  the  bet- 
ter. 

On  the  other  hand,  if  you  knew  for  certain  that  a 
high  school  diploma  would  help  you  become  a  rich 
man,  you'd  get  one,  wouldn't  you  ?  And  if  a  college 
A.B.  were  exchangeable  for  $20,000  in  bank  the  day 
of  your  graduation,  you'd  get  that  diploma,  too,  or 
break  a  trace  pulling  for  it. 

Your  biggest  question,  therefore,  just  now,  on 
which  your  youth  and  manhood  both  depend,  is  this : 

DOES  ALL  THIS  BOOK  LEAENING  PAY? 

Many  people  declare  that  studying  Latin  and 
algebra  and  history  and  geometry  will  never  help 
you  earn  a  dollar.  Are  they  right  or  wrong  ? 

Suppose  we  were  to  canvass  all  the  thousands  of 
business  men  in  a  given  city  or  county,  and,  by  prom- 
ising to  make  no  names  public,  find  out  from  each  one 
how  much  education  he  had  before  entering  business 
and  how  much  he  is  personally  earning  per  year. 
Suppose  we  then  classified  all  these  thousands  accord* 
ing  to  their  education,  got  the  average  earnings  of 
each  class,  and  then  tabulated  the  results.  Then  we'd 
know  (wouldn't  we?)  without  any  guessing,  or 
partiality,  or  argument. 


50  YOUK  BIGGEST  JOB 

Such  expensive  and  elaborate  investigations  have 
been  made  in  many  sections  of  the  United  States. 
For  lack  of  space  I  will  give  only  a  few,  and  will 
confine  the  exhibit  to  graded  and  high  school  training. 

1.  In  Brooklyn. — Ten  thousand  men  in  jobs  re- 
quiring only  a  common  school  education  averaged  a 
yearly  income  of  $657.     One  thousand  five  hundred 
and  seventy-nine  holding  jobs  in  the  service  of  the 
city  government  which  required  all  applicants  to  have 
a  high  school  training  were  getting  an  average  salary 
of  $1597. 

This  average  difference  of  $940  represents  the 
earning  power  of  $18,800  at  5  per  cent,  or  an  aver- 
age of  $26  for  every  school  day  of  the  four-year  high 
school  course  ! 

2.  In  New  York. — A  thorough  and  widely  ex- 
tended  investigation  among  thousands  of  business 
men  revealed  the  fact  that  boys  leaving  school  at  14 
were,  at  25  years  old,  after  11  years  of  business  ex- 
perience, earning  $661  per  year;  those  leaving  school 
at  18  were,  at  25,  after  7  years  in  business,  earning 
an  average  of  $1612  a  year.    The  difference,  $951  a 
year,  represents  the  earning  power  of  $19,000  at 
5  per  cent,  or  $26.85  for  every  school  day  of  the 
added  four  years.     In  offering  to  every  New  York 


CASH  VALUE  OF  BOOK  LEARNING   51 

and  Brooklyn  boy,  free  of  charge,  a  four-year  high 
school  course,  the  city  was  really  offering  them  on  the 
average,  counting  all  the  dull  and  lazy  as  well  as  the 
bright  and  diligent,  a  5  per  cent  bank  deposit  of 
$19,000.  Yet  thousands  doomed  themselves  to  life- 
long poverty  because  they  didn't  have  enough  business 
sense  to  see  it.  How  is  it  with  you? 

3.  In  Minneapolis. — Three  thousand  three  hun- 
dred and  forty-five  boys  who  finished  the  eighth  grade 
and  went  into  business  received  an  average  salary  of 
$240  their  first  year.  Nine  hundred  and  two  had 
sense  enough  to  keej>  on  and  finish  the  regular  high 
school  course  (which  so  many  of  your,  "fool-kid"  play- 
ground advisers  say  is  "no  good  in  business").  They 
received,  on  the  average,  $600  their  first  year.  Of 
course,  with  their  added  intelligence,  they  rose  in 
business  twice  as  fast  as  their  ignorant  competitors; 
but  suppose,  for  argument's  sake,  that  all  of  them 
kept  earning  only  their  initial  salary  till  they  were 
.60.  The  graded-school  men,  with  46  years  of  labor, 
would  have  received,  as  the  money-value  of  their 
life's  work,  $11,040  in  hard  cash.  The  high  school 
men,  working  42  years,  would  have  averaged  $28,800. 
This  means  that,  on  the  basis  of  first-year  earning 
power,  the  720  days  of  "unpractical"  high  school 


52  YOUR  BIGGEST  JOB 

study  added  in  cash  $17,760  to  their  future  wages, 
an  average  of  $24.66  for  every  day's  study! 

Or,  take  another  way  of  looking  at  it.  With  every 
high  school  diploma  went  an  added  earning  power 
of  $360  per  year  over  the  graded  school  graduate. 
This  equals  $7200  invested  at  5  per  cent,  an  average 
increase  in  each  boy's  initial  value  as  a  money-maker 
of  exactly  $10  for  each  high  school  day. 

4.  Factory  Workers  in  43  Cities  in  Massachusetts. 
— Those  hoys  who  entered  business  at  14  with  only 
graded  school  training  were  at  25  earning  $650  per 
year.     Those  who  finished  the  technical  and  com- 
mercial courses  of  the  city  high  schools,  leaving  school 
at  18,  were  at  25  earning  an  average  income  of  $1550. 
This  is  almost  exactly  the  same  result  as  in  IsTew  York 
and  Brooklyn.    At  25,  in  the  prime  of  life,  with  an 
equal  chance  for  all,  except  in  the  added  education, 
every  high  school  man,  on  the  average,  finds  his  train- 
ing, in  the  matter  of  income  alone,  worth  $900  per 
year,  or  $18,000  invested  at  5  per  cent.    During  his 
whole  high  school  course  he  was  thus  laying  up  a 
life-time  investment  in  brains,  out  of  reach  of  fire  or 
thieves  or  business  risks,  at  the  rate  of  $25  a  day. 

5.  In  and  Near  Philadelphia. — An  investigation, 
covering  months  of  time  and  many  thousands  of  cases, 


proved  that  those  who  began  work  as  untrained  labor- 
ers at  16  received  increasing  wages  till  21,  when  their 
income  stopped  rising,  and  remained  stationery  at 
$510  a  year. 

Technical,  school  graduates,  starting  at  22,  earned 
more  each  year  till  at  32  they  reached  their  maxi- 
mum, which  averaged  $2150.  This  difference  in  edu- 
cation, therefore,  was  worth  in  earning-power  $32,800 
at  5  per  cent. 

6.  In  Tompkins  County,  N.  Y  —  Out  of  1287 
small  farmers,  only  280  had  ever  attended  high  school 
at  all.  They  were  earning  an  average  of  $622  a  year, 
the  rest  averaged  only  $318. 

I  could  go  on  almost  without  limit,  hut  as  every 
such  investigation  tells  the  same  tale,  why  multiply 
instances  ?  In  this  age  of  brains  mere  muscle  is  dirt 
cheap — a  gallon  of  gasoline  can  outwork  a  hundred 
men — but  in  the  market  of  twentieth  century  civiliza- 
tion the  cash  value  of  trained  brains  is  already  "out 
of  sight"  and  rising  every  day.  If  you  ever  expect 
to  develop  good  horse  sense  in  business,,  show  it  now, 
before  it  is  too  late,  by  investing  your  boyhood  energy 
in  a  good  education. 


CHAPTEE  IX 

THE  FIRST  LESSON  OF  THE  WORLD  WAR:   THE  VALUE 
OF  MORALE 

If  our  school-armies  of  young  Americans  will  but 
learn  and  practice  this  greatest  lesson  of  the 
greatest  war,  our  stern  teacher's  huge  tuition 
fees  of  blood  and  tears  and  taxes  will  prove  a, 
wise  and  dividend-paying  investment. 

AN  OLI>TIME  BATTLEFIELD 

The  battlefields  of  former  wars,  with  their  gallop- 
ing officers  and  brilliant  uniforms,  their  floating  flags 
and  battle-cheers  and  roll  of  martial  music,  were 
often  scenes  of  beauty  and  splendor.  Such  knightly 
fighters  did  not  stoop  to  common  toil.  The  fierce 
game  of  war  had  little  in  common  with  everyday 
life.  The  soldier  and  the  workman  belonged  to  dif- 
ferent worlds. 

54 


FIRST  LESSON"  OF  THE  WORLD  WAR    55 

MODERN"  WARFARE 

The  modern  soldier  adds  to  his  fighting  duties  the 
ceaseless  toil  of  the  quarry-slave,  and  far  behind  the 
lines  of  battle  are  marshaled  endless  lines  of  labor,  all 
enlisted  in  the  same  army  and  fighting  for  the  same 
cause.  Overcoming  material  obstacles  is  often  a  se- 
verer test  of  soldierly  qualities  than  vanquishing  mere 
flesh-and-blood  opponents.  To  maintain  undiminished 
for  long  weeks  and  months  a  soldier's  fiery  ardor 
amid  the  filth  and  vermin  and  crushing  toil  of  the 
trenches  demands  a  sterner  type  of  heroism  than  to 
brave  for  a  few  hours  the  flaming  terrors  of  No  Man's 
Land.  Our  American  soldier  in  his  working  khaki, 
with  his  rifle  in  his  hands  and  his  trench-tools  on  hi8 
back,  his  fighting  and  working  fused  into  one  con- 
tinuous effort,  is  not  only  a  finer  type  of  battle-hero 
than  the  plumed  knights  of  old,  but  more  nearly 
represents  the  life  and  ideals  of  modern  democracy, 
in  which  every  soldier  works  and  every  workman 
fights  in  common  fellowship  and  common  devotion  for 
the  common  good.  Thus  modern  life  and  modern 
warfare  are  now  but  different  phases  of  the  same 
endless  struggle,  and  the  qualities  which  win  victory 
in  one  insure  success  in  the  other. 


56  YOUB  BIGGEST  JOB 

THE  ONE  IEEESISTIBLE  WEAPON 

For  thousands  of  years  man  has  been  inventing  and 
forging  weapons  of  war  till  the  very  thunderbolts 
of  heaven  are  outdone  by  his  awful  engines  of  destruc- 
tion. 

Yet  now,  as  from  the  very  beginning,  the  most 
potent  instrument  of  attack,  the  surest  means  of  de- 
fense, the  mightiest  and  most  irresistible  weapon  in 
all  the  vast  and  varied  armory  of  war  is  the  soldier's 
heart. 

Every  invention  which  increases  the  terrors  of 
warfare  adds  to  the  importance  of  this,  the  most  an- 
cient weapon  of  all.  Its  possession  doubles  the 
efficiency  of  all  other  agencies  of  warfare,  sweetens 
toil  and  sacrifice,  gives  joy  in  battle  and  fortitude 
in  the  trenches,  and  constitutes  a  surer  guarantee  of 
victory  than  numbers,  equipment,  or  resources.  Vain 
are  material  weapons  against  the  invisible  might  of  a 
dauntless  heart. 

THE  ONE  FATAL  ARMY  DISEASE 

As  man  has  concentrated  his  armies  and  multiplied 
his  agents  of  destruction,  nature  has  kept  pace  with 


FIRST  LESSON  OF  THE  WORLD  WAR    57 

hers.  Among  his  vast  and  crowded  camps  trench- 
fever  and  consumption,  gangrene  and  typhus  and 
lockjaw,  syphilis  and  influenza  and  pneumonia  are 
ever  waging  their  hostile  campaign. 

Yet  every  wise  general  knows  that  the  one  really 
fatal  army  disease,  as  contagious  as  it  is  deadly,  is 
heart-failure.  Whatever  its  varied  symptoms  and 
grades  of  virulence  may  be,  from  rank  cowardice  and 
open  mutiny  to  loss  of  morale  and  mere  homesickness, 
it  is  always  and  everywhere  the  patriot's  worst 
enemy,  the  foe's  most  efficient  ally.  As  modern  weap- 
ons are  vain  against  the  armor  of  a  soldier's  heart, 
more  impotent  still  are  they  in  the  hands  of  an  army 
which  fears  to  fight  and  shrinks  from  toil  and  sacri- 
fice. A  tiny  bird  defending  its  young  can  put  a 
mastiff  to  flight;  a  thousand  sheep  will  flee  at  a 
puppy's  bark.  An  army  afflicted  with  heart-failure 
has  already  surrendered  to  the  enemy. 

THE  LESSON  OF  THE  WAS 

War  has  proved  a  stern  teacher,  with  huge  tuition 
fees  from  all  and  relentless  punishments  for  the 
stupid  and  obstinate.  Let  young  America  be  wise 
enough  to  earn  dividends  on  the  one  and  avoid  the 


58  TOUR  BIGGEST  JOB 

pains  and  perils  of  the  other  by  learning  and  applying 
war's  first  and  most  important  lesson — that  the  key 
to  victory  in  conflict,  efficiency  in  service,  and  joy  in 
both  is  found,  not  in  the  army's  numbers  and  equip- 
ment, but  in  the  soldier's  heart. 

WHERE  IT  Is  MOST  DEEDED 

Nowhere  is  the  parallel  more  exact  or  the  lesson 
more  needed  than  among  the  armies  of  young  Amer- 
icans mobilized  in  our  schools  and  colleges.  They, 
too,  under  trained  and  zealous  officers,  are  waging 
organized  warfare  against  open  foes  in  front  and  hid- 
den enemies  in  the  rear,  with  every  campus  a  battle- 
field and  student-life  a  chemical  combination  of  end- 
less conflict  and  equally  endless  labor. 

Let  every  American  student,  therefore,  turn  upon 
himself  and  his  fellows  the  searchlight  of  our  recent 
army  experiences  and  answer  such  questions  as  these : 

Are  jou  and  your  fellow-soldiers  loyal  to  the  great 
cause  for  whose  furtherance  you  have  enlisted  ?  Have 
you  formed  for  yourself  a  clear  conception  of  the 
meaning  and  issues  of  the  war,  the  deadly  dangers  of 
ignorance  in  a  democracy,  the  necessity  of  education 
where  the  people  are  their  own  rulers  ?  Is  your  soul 


FIKST  LESSON  OF  THE  WOKLD  WAE    59 

on  fire  with,  the  determination  to  be  victor  in  your 
own  individual  conflict  with  ignorance  ?  Do  you  go 
through  your  daily  routine  drill  with  "pep"  and*  en- 
thusiasm? Textbooks  and  recitations  and  school 
equipment  and  trained  officers  are  all  doomed  to  de- 
feat, if  the  students  have  no  stomach  for  the  fight,  and 
indifference  and  treachery  are  hoisting  white  flags  in 
the  rear.  7s  your  heart  in  your  job  ? 

Are  you  loyal  to  your  company  ?  Is  the  spirit  of 
the  playground  and  the  campus  one  of  warm  and 
helpful  comradeship,  of  devotion  to  your  institution, 
of  enthusiasm  for  her  educational  ideals  and  appre- 
ciation for  the  priceless  benefits  she  confers?  Or 
is  the  spirit  of  the  school  poisoned  by  disaffection 
and  its  great  work  hampered  by  constant  criticism 
and  shallow  opposition?  Is  your  heart  with  your 
school? 

Are  you  loyal  to  your  officers  ?  Do  you  appreciate 
their  aims  and  their  labors,  render  prompt  and  will- 
ing obedience  to  their  orders,  and  second  all  their 
efforts  to  increase  the  efficiency  and  zeal  of  the  stud- 
ent-body? Or  are  you  cultivating  a  camp-habit  of 
fault-finding  and  mutiny,  of  evasion  and  half-hearted 
obedience,  till  the  whole  camp  atmosphere  is  so 
warped  and  poisoned  with  disloyalty  that  deriding 


60  YOUK  BIGGEST  JOB 

and  belittling  your  teachers  becomes  the  campus 
fashion  and  to  profess  love  and  admiration  for  them 
awakens  suspicion  and  distrust  ?  If  so,  rest  assured 
that  your  soldier's  heart  is  rotting  at  its  very  core, 
and  your  school-corps  is  in  open  league  with  the 
enemy. 

To  new  recruits  like  yourselves  the  trenches  are 
a  severer  test  than  the  battle-front.  To  bear  with  a 
soldier's  cheerful  courage  the  monotony  and  fatigue 
of  steady  toil,  to  be  victor  over  circumstances  without 
and  temptations  within,  to  form  the  soldier's  habit 
of  choosing  the  right  rather  than  the  easy,,  the  popu- 
lar, and  the  profitable — these  victories  of  the  spirit 
are  the  hardest  of  all  to  win. 

It  is  also  true  that  in  spite  of  modern  sanitation 
the  tragedies  of  the  trenches  are  more  numerous  than 
those  of  the  firing-line.  Their  deadly  and  contagious 
filth-diseases  and  cowardly  self-indulgence  claim  more 
victims  than  the  bombs  and  bayonets  of  the  enemy. 
If  all  the  youthful  combatants  whose  soldier-hearts 
have  succumbed  to  their  fatal  poison  were  buried 
where  they  fell,  our  lovely  school-grounds  and  verdant 
campus  lawns  would  be  ghastly  with  thick-strewn 
headstones. 


FIKST  LESSON  OF  THE  WOKLD  WAK    61 

THE  CONCLUSION 

Most  of  those  who  read  these  lines  are  youthful 
combatants,  just  reaching  the  battlefield  where 
American  manhood  must  meet  its  ancient  foes.  If 
you  would  imitate  our  gallant  heroes  of  Chateau- 
Thierry  and  the  Argonne  and  like  them  establish  the 
habit  of  victory  by  winning  your  first  battles,  learn 
well  this  greatest  lesson  of  the  greatest  war : 

That  twentieth  century  warfare  is  a  chemical  com- 
bination of  fighting  and  working,  that  cowardice  and 
laziness  are  equally  unsoldierlike,  that  unselfish 
comradeship  in  the  ranks  and  unshaken  loyalty  to 
your  leaders  is  a  soldier's  primal  duty,  and  that  joy 
in  battle  and  your  whole  heart  in  your  work  are  both 
the  price  of  victory  and  the  key  to  happiness. 


CHAPTER  X 

A  SQUARE  DEAL  FOE  THE  HOME  FOLKS 

A  word  of  sympathetic  counsel  for  boys  who  are  pass- 
ing through  the  "Troublesome  Period"  immedi- 
ately preceding  manhood.  Commended  also  to 
the  attention  of  their  perplexed  and  sometimes 
indignant  parents. 

THE  "TROUBLESOME  PERIOD" 

During  the  period  immediately  preceding  manhood 
the  rapidly  developing  boy  often  gets  out  of  tune 
with  his  surroundings  and  causes  his  parents  much 
anxiety  and  alarm.  His  attitude  and  conduct  are 
marked  by  a  bewildering  mixture  of  painful  bash- 
fulness  and  defiant  self-assertion,  of  eager  and  servile 
compliance  with  the  fashions  and  opinions  of  his 
"gang,"  and  of  stubborn  and  scornful  argumentative- 
ness  with  the  "old  folks"  at  home. 

62 


A  SQUAEE  DEAL  FOR  HOME  FOLKS  63 

Often  lie  develops  a  new  and  irritating  sense  of 
responsibility  for  the  conduct  of  the  whole  family, 
and  passes  judgment  with  impartial  contempt  and 
humiliation  on  the  old-fogyism  of  the  elder  members 
and  the  childishness  of  the  younger.  His  former  af- 
fection, docility,  and  family  loyalty  give  place  to  a 
restless  dissatisfaction  with  the  routine  of  home  and 
school  duties  and  a  resentment  of  parental  control 
which  often  wreck  the  harmony  and  happiness  of  his 
home-circle. 

To  the  perplexed  and  indignant  parents  their  form- 
erly lovable  and  obedient  boy  seems  rapidly  deterior- 
ating in  habits,  disposition,  and  character.  To  the 
boy  it  seems  that  old  and  young  have  "fallen  out" 
with  him  and  are  conspiring  to  deny  him  the  rights 
and  privileges  of  manhood.  To  feoth  it  is  undoubtedly 
a  difficult  and  dangerous  transition  period  whose  com- 
plex problems  require  for  their  successful  solution 
genuine  affection,  mutual  forbearance,  and  a  clear 
understanding  of  the  situation. 

ITS  KATTJBE  AND  MEANING 

The  key  to  the  problem  lies  in  the  fact  that  during 
this  momentous  period  the  oncoming  man-nature  of 


64  YOUE  BIGGEST  JOB 

the  future  is  in  conflict  with  and  is  steadily  overcom- 
ing the  boy-nature  of  the  past.  Their  daily  conflict  and 
their  joint  or  alternating  control  give  rise  to  the  other- 
wise inexplicable  fickleness  and  stubborn  unreason- 
ableness of  the  boy-man's  attitude  and  conduct 

The  typical  virtues  of  childhood,  which  delight 
the  heart  and  smooth  the  road  of  every  parent  and 
teacher,  are  trustfulness,  teachableness,  and  willing 
obedience.  These  spring  from  childhood's  inexperi- 
ence, ignorance,  and  weakness.  Before  the  boy  can 
become  a  real  man  they  must  be  replaced  by  independ- 
ence, initiative,  will-power,  self-control,  and  self- 
direction. 

In  the  simplicity  of  savage  life  the  boy  of  fifteen 
or  sixteen,  as  soon  as  these  instincts  develop  and 
nature  prompts  independence,  can  take  his  weapons 
of  the  chase  and  strike  out  for  himself.  Among  the 
illiterate  of  civilized  nations  the  case  is  almost  as 
simple.  The  boy  begins  "working  for  himself,"  with 
little  or  no  Jvarental  control,  as  soon  as  his  body  is 
reasonably  well  grown. 

Among  highly  educated  nations,  however,  our  com- 
plex and  artificial  civilization  has  found  it  necessary 
to  lengthen  the  legal  period  of  childhood  and  formal 
schooling  far  beyond  the  time  when  these  instincts  of 


A  SQUAKE  DEAL  FOE  HOME  FOLKS  65 

manhood  develop.  The  boy  of  sixteen  or  seventeen 
thus  finds  his  newborn  instincts  and  desires  in  con- 
flict with  the  prolonged  guidance  and  control  which 
his  proper  preparation  for  civilized  life  makes  neces- 
sary. 

Along  with  this  instinctive  resentment  at  former 
control  comes  an  equally  instinctive  and  irresistible 
impulse  to  harmonize  with"  the  new  world  of  which  he 
is  soon  to  become  a  constituent  unit.  Hence  the  boy 
who  eagerly  argues  against  the  most  cherished  con- 
victions of  his  parents  and  pastor  is  overwhelmed 
with  confusion  to  find  himself  at  a  "party"  wearing 
the  wrong  kind  of  necktie,  and  accepts  with  slavish 
loyalty  the  half-baked  opinions  of  his  "set"  on  all 
questions  of  manners  or  morals. 

A  WOED  TO  PARENTS 

During  this  trying  period  the  perplexed  parent 
should  recognize  with  a  sigh  of  relief  that  for  this 
boyhood  ailment  Father  Time  is  a  more  effective 
physician  than  he.  He  should,  therefore,  be  wisely 
blind  to  minor  follies,  cultivate  sympathetic  forbear- 
ance, and  often  find  relief  in  a  sense  of  humor. 
During  a  period  of  such  ultra-sensitiveness  the  wise 


66  YOUR  BIGGEST  JOB 

parent  will  especially  avoid  threats,  open  challenges, 
and  humiliation  in  the  presence  of  others.  To  "con- 
quer" the  boy,  cow  his  spirit,  or  "break  his  will"  at 
this  age  is  close  akin  to  murder.  The  awakening 
will-power  and  fighting-spirit  so  troublesome  now 
may  in  a  few  years  become  the  glory  of  his  manhood 
and  the  pride  of  his  parents. 

Try  guidance,  therefore,  rather  than  repression. 
Recognizing  that  this  revolution  cannot  go  backward, 
train  the  boy  as  rapidly  as  possible  in  self-direction 
and  the  acceptance  of  personal  responsibility.  Confer 
liberties  just  as  fast  as  they  can  be  wisely  used.  Shift 
your  formerly  autocratic  control,  your  disciplinary 
parental  relationship,  towards  that  of  guide,  coun- 
selor, and  comrade.  You  will  doubtless  be  astonished 
at  the  effectiveness  of  the  new  method  and  your  son's 
delighted  appreciation  of  the  new  attitude. 

To  THE  BOY  APPROACHING  MANHOOD 

If  there  is  increasing  friction  between  yourself  and 
your  parents  and  teachers,  and  a  growing  resentment 
on  your  part  at  being  "treated  like  a  child,"  the  real 
difficulty  is  almost  certainly  this — that  you  desire  and 
claim  a  man's  liberty  before  you  have  convinced  those 


A  SQUARE  DEAL  FOR  HOME  FOLKS     6T 

who  have  governed  your  childhood  that  you  will  not 
abuse  such  freedom  by  choosing  to  do  wrong. 

Whatever  you  may  think  of  it,  the  world,  the  law, 
and  their  own  consciences  hold  your  parents  respon- 
sible for  your  conduct.  They  cannot,  therefore,  let 
you  do  as  you  please  until  you  have  convinced  them 
that  you  will  please  to  do  right.  It  is  unreasonable 
for  you  to  claim,  and  wrong  for  them  to  grant,  the 
liberties  of  manhood  as  long  as  you  feel  and  act  like 
a  child. 

Take,  for  example,  the  routine  of  your  daily  per- 
sonal duties, — getting  up  at  the  appointed  time, 
looking  after  your  clothes,  hair,  teeth,  nails,  shoes, 
and  laundry,  attending  meals  punctually,  getting  to 
school  on  time,  performing  your  special  tasks  about 
the  house,  going  to  church  and  Sunday  school,  and 
all  the  other  items  of  your  regular  home-program. 
Does  it  "make  you  mad"  to  be  continually  reminded 
of  these  things  and  scolded  or  punished  "like  a  child" 
when  you  neglect  them  ?  Then  remember  that  a  really 
grown-up  man  does  them  all  as  regularly  as  clock- 
work without  a  word  of  reminder  from  anybody. 
Be  grown  up,  therefore,  instead  of  merely  claiming 
to  be.  Try  that  on  your  parents  and  see  how  gladly- 


68  TOUK  BIGGEST  JOB 

they  will  relinquish  to  their  manly  son  the  entire 
management  of  his  daily  routine. 

Then  practice  your  developing  manhood  in  a 
broader  field, — that  of  choosing  your  own  hours  of 
study,  recreation,  and  retiring,  going  out  in  the  after- 
noon or  evening  and  getting  home  promptly  at  the 
right  time,  purchasing  your  own  clothes,  handling 
your  own  money,  going  to  picture  shows,  or  fishing, 
hunting,  auto-driving,  etc. 

In  all  these  matters  let  your  steadfast  aim  be  to 
prove  to  your  parents  that  orders,  reminders,  control, 
and  oversight  are  in  your  case  entirely  unnecessary. 
Try  this  method  on  them  a  few  months  and  nobody 
will  dream  of  "treating  you  like  a  child"  any  longer. 

To  sum  it  all  up  in  three  sentences :  Quit  claiming 
a  man's  liberty  till  you  can  use  it  like  a  man.  To  act 
like  a  child  and  then  blame  your  parents  for  treating 
you  like  one  is  to  prove  their  wisdom  and  your  own 
lack  of  manhood.  Either  submit  loyally  as  a  child 
to  their  authority,  or  prove  to  them  that  you  are  man 
enough  not  to  need  it. 

Give  the  home  folks  a  square  deal. 


CHAPTER  XI 

COLLEGE  AKD  UJflVEESITY  TBAINIITO 

Some  important  facts  for  the  consideration  of  per- 
plexed parents  and  ambitious  young  men. 

1.  A  college  education  is  to-day  almost  a  necessity 
to  one  desiring  to  win  leadership  and  conspicuous 
success.    Only  one  per  cent  of  our  population  are  col- 
lege-trained, yet  they  furnish  almost  seven-eighths 
of  our  prominent  men. 

2.  A  college  education  is  the  only  gateway  to  the 
great  professions  of  Medicine  and  Surgery,  Law, 
Diplomacy,  and  Teaching,  and  the  various  branches 
of  Engineering,  chemical,  civil,  electrical,  mechan- 
ical, etc.    It  is  almost  equally  necessary  for  success 
in  Journalism,  Authorship,  and  the  Ministry.    These 
ever-widening  avenues  to  fame,  wealth,  and  useful- 
ness are  closed  to  the  man  who  does  not  "go  to  col- 


69 


70  YOUK  BIGGEST  JOB 

3.  A  college  education  to-day  need  not  be  confined 
to  classical  languages  and  abstract  studies.    A  mod- 
ern School  of  Commerce  in  a  "literary  college"  gives, 
along  with  college  culture,  a  thorough  and  practical 
training  for  broad-minded  leadership  in  Business, 
Law,  Politics,  and  Journalism. 

4.  A  college  education  cannot  be  "given"  to  any 
one.    A  father's  money  may  give  the  opportunity  but 
not  the  education.    That  is  a  treasure  each  must  dig 
out  for  himself.     The  college  loafer  never  gets  it, 
however  prolonged  his  residence. 

5.  A  college  education  is  within  the  reach  of  any 
young  man  of  health  and  energy  and  willpower. 
In  these  days  of  loans,  prizes,  scholarships,  vacation 
jobs,  and  outside  work,  poverty  is  a  test  and  stimulus, 
but  need  never  be  a  barrier. 

6.  A  college  education,  viewed  simply  as  an  aid  to 
money-making,  adds  to  the  income  of  the  average 
graduate  not  less  than  $1,250  per  annum  for  life, 
equal  to  $25,000  safely  invested  at  5  per  cent 

7.  A  college  education,  however,  is  very  variable  in 
value,  whether  measured  by  the  earning  power  or  by 
the  future  leadership  of  the  graduate.     By  either 
measurement  the  training  of  an  honor-graduate  is 


COLLEGE  TKAINING  71 

worth  several  times  as  much,  as  that  of  a  "tail-ender," 
though  both  are  awarded  the  same  diploma. 

8.  Never  has  the  call  for  educated  leadership  been 
so  insistent  as  now.     Kever  has  the  public  been  so 
convinced  of  the  practical  value  of  college  training 
as  since  the  experiences  of  the  Great  War.  And  never 
has  a  thorough  college  education,  backed  by  char- 
acter and  energy,  promised  such  large  and  certain 
dividends  of  wealth,  fame,  and  opportunity  as  dur- 
ing this  post-war  era  of  ferment  and  reconstruction. 

9.  A  college  education  consists  of  two  parts :    The 
intellectual  training  of  the  classroom  and  laboratory 
under  the  occasional  instruction  of  the  faculty,  and 
the  moral  and  social  development  produced  by  the 
customs  and  traditions  of  the  campus  under  the 
hourly  influence  of  the  students  and  their  organiza- 
tions and  activities. 

10.  A  college  education  of  the  intellect,  gained  in 
thoroughly  equipped  laboratories  and  libraries,  while 
the  student's  morals  and  religious  ideals  are  rotted 
out  by  breathing  a  poisoned  campus  atmosphere,  is 
an  irreparable  injury  rather  than  a  benefit.     Such  a 
graduate  is  already  a  bankrupt,  having  sold  his  birth- 
right for  a  mess  of  pottage. 

11.  Since  each  campus  has  its  own  customs,  stand- 


72  TOUR  BIGGEST  JOB 

ards,  and  moral  atmosphere,  which  are  almost  as  per- 
manent as  its  buildings  and  mold  every  student  with 
an  overwhelming  influence,  the  parent  or  prospective 
student  who  selects  a  college  without  a  careful  study 
of  its  campus  customs  and  morals  is  acting  with 
singular  lack  of  judgment  and  incurring  a  grave  risk. 

12.  The  bane  of  college  life  is  childish,  frivolous 
self-indulgence;  a  lack  of  iron  in  the  blood;  a  weak- 
willed  following  of  the  crowd.     In  many  campus 
circles  high-minded  earnestness  is  not  good  form, 
college  "life"  is  regarded  as  of  far  more  importance 
than  college  study,  and  hard  work  is  ridiculed  as  a 
sure  sign  of  "freshness"  and  inexperience. 

Let  the  boy  who  is  looking  forward  to  college  re- 
member that  none  of  life's  prizes  is  offered  to  the 
loafer,  and  of  all  the  many  varieties  of  that  worth- 
less product  of  our  artificial  modern  life  the  college 
loafer  fooling  away  his  priceless  opportunity  is  the 
most  suicidally  foolish  and  shortsighted. 

13.  Where  a  college  faculty  accepts  full  respon- 
sibility for  the  social  and  moral  life  of  the  campus 
and  exercises  a  constant  and  sympathetic  supervision 
and  control  of  the  individual  students  and  of  their 
organizations,  there  is  no  question  that  the  moral 
standards  of  such  a  college  community  are  higher, 


COLLEGE  TKAINING  73 

cleaner,  and  more  uplifting  than  those  of  any  ordi- 
nary American  town  or  city.  A  boy  in  such  an  insti- 
tution is  generally  safer,  from  a  moral  standpoint, 
than  at  home. 


CHAPTER  XH 

THE  HOME  HALF  OP  COLLEGE  PREPARATION 

Some  additional  facts  of  great  importance  to  boys 
preparing  for  college  and  to  their  parents 

To  THE  BOY  PREPARING  FOR  COLLEGE 

You  must  possess  two  things  before  you  are  "ready 
for  college" :  First,  a  certain  amount  of  high,  school 
training ;  second,  enough  manhood  and  self-control  to 
study  regularly  without  compulsion,  attend  to  routine 
duties  of  your  own  accord,  and  choose  every  day  what 
you  know  is  right  and  wise  rather  than  what  is  easy 
and  pleasant.  In  spite  of  all  the  school-talk  of  Car- 
negie units  and  diplomas  and  certificates  and  en- 
trance examinations  and  college  standards,  the  second 
element  is  twice  as  important  as  the  first.  Be  wise 
enough  to  recognize  it. 

74 


COLLEGE  PREPARATION  75 

To  THE  PARENT  WHOSE  BOY  Is  PEEPAEING  FOB 
COLLEGE 

Your  boy's  preparation  for  college  consists  of  two 
parts,  the  high  school  half  and  the  home  half.  The 
first  attracts  much  attention,  utilizes  costly  buildings 
and  expensive  teachers,  and  absorbs  five  or  six  hours 
of  your  boy's  time  every  day.  You  may  be  so  misled 
by  this  elaborate  machinery  as  to  undervalue  and 
neglect  your  share  of  the  great  task.  A  lifetime  of 
experience  has  taught  me  that  the  home  half  is  far 
more  important  and  far  oftener  neglected  than  the 
school  half  of  a  boy's  preparation.  Since  your  boy's 
future  is  at  stake,  do  not  let  a  hired  teacher  surpass 
you  in  zeal  or  in  definiteness  of  program. 

To  THE  BOY 

A  modern  American  college  or  university  is  not  a 
playground  or  a  social  club.  It  is  a  vast  and  varied 
workshop,  where  scores  of  expert  workmen  are  show- 
ing hundreds  of  clumsy  and  untrained  apprentices 
how  to  use  their  tools  and  make  all  sorts  of  things 
tHe  world  must  have  and  is  willing  to  pay  for. 

All  that  your  high  school  "units"  can  do  for  you 
is  to  furnish  you  a  kit  of  tools  and  put  you  inside  the 


76  YOTJK  BIGGEST  JOB 

door.  It  then  depends  on  your  character  and  will- 
power whether  you  will  play  with  the  shavings  on  the 
floor  like  a  baby,  look  out  of  the  windows  at  the  pas- 
sers-by like  a  child,  or  use  your  tools  like  a  man  and 
make  of  yourself  a  master  workman.  After  you  are 
once  inside  the  college  door,  an  ounce  of  manhood  is 
worth  a  ton  of  units  and  a  ream  of  certificates. 

To  THE  PAEENT 

Your  boy's  will  should  be  approaching  maturity 
as  rapidly  as  his  mind  and  body.  It  must  soon  take 
the  helm,  determining  his  character,  career,  and 
destiny  in  college,  after  college,  and  forever.  Like 
the  mind  it  can  grow  only  by  exercising  itself. 

If  your  boy's  teacher  insisted  on  working  all  hia 
problems  for  him,  writing  all  his  exercises,  and 
answering  all  his  examinations  questions,  you  would 
rate  him  a  very  harmful  lunatic  whose  criminal  kind- 
ness was  robbing  your  boy  of  every  opportunity  of 
training  and  developing  his  mind.  Yet  often  a 
parent,  with  mistaken  and  harmful  zeal,  insists  on 
performing  all  the  will-exercises  which  are  necessary 
for  his  son's  development.  Although  their  boys  are 
rapidly  approaching  maturity,  many  parents  continue 
to  treat  them  as  children,  reminding  them  of  all  their 


COLLEGE  PKEPAKATIOST  77 

routine  duties,  choosing  for  them  their  clothes,  games, 
companions,  and  food,  making  them  go  to  bed  at 
night  and  getting  them  out  every  morning,  telling 
them  when  to  begin  studying  and  when  they  may 
quit,  thus  carrying  out  at  home  the  very  program 
they  would  condemn  as  criminal  folly  at  school. 

Such  parental  zeal,  however  commendable  its  mo- 
tive, is  often  more  injurious  than  blows  or  neglect. 
An  undeveloped  mind  in  college  is  a  handicap,  gen- 
erally removable  by  time  and  labor;  an  undeveloped 
will  may  at  any  time  result  in  irremediable  tragedy. 
!NTo  entrance  examinations  have  yet  been  devised 
which  can  detect  in  advance  the  fatal  combination  of 
a  child's  will  holding  the  reins  over  a  man's  appetites 
and  passions. 

To  THE  BOY 

For  every  boy  who,  in  spite  of  his  best  efforts, 
makes  a  failure  of  his  college  course  for  lack  of 
mental  training  a  hundred  fail  for  lack  of  will-power. 
To  be  "ready  for  college"  means  to  be  prepared  not 
only  for  college  studies  but  for  college  life.  If  you 
are  too  weak-willed  and  childish  for  the  second,  no 
high  school  course  on  earth  can  enable  you  to  make  a 
success  of  the  first. 


78  YOUH  BIGGEST  JOB 

Before  you  go  to  college  learn  to  steer  your  own 
course,  furnish  your  own  steam-power,  accept  your 
own  responsibilities,  and  perform  promptly  and  reg- 
ularly your  daily  duties,  without  having  any  one 
remind  you,  urge  you,  or  order  you.  If  you  learn  this 
lesson  well,  I  would  rate  it  as  three-fourths  of  your 
real  preparation  for  college. 

To  PARENT  AND  PROSPECTIVE  STUDENT — A  PRAC- 
TICAL SUGGESTION 

Draw  up  in  joint  conference  a  short  simple  daily 
schedule  with  blank  space  for  report.  Make  many 
copies,  and  every  night  let  the  boy  hand  in  his  report 
for  that  day.  Sunday  afternoon  let  the  preceding 
seven  reports  be  summarized  in  a  percentage  grade 
for  each  item.  Here  is  a  sample  report: 

Wednesday,  May  3 

SCHEDULE  REPORT 

1.  Risingj  7:30.  1.  5  min.  late. 

2.  School,  9:00.  2.  O.  K. 

3.  Home  study  at  3.  155  min. 

least  2  1-2  hrs.  (Geom.,  40  m.) 

(Eng.,     55   ") 
(Ldt.,      60    ") 

4.  Bed,  10:15.  4.  O.K. 


COLLEGE  PREPARATION  79 

Of  course  Sunday  and  Saturday  schedules  may  be 
different  and  the  items  may  be  varied  at  will  The 
essential  points  are : 

1.  To  make  out  a  program, 

2.  To  place  the  entire  responsibility  on  the  boy's 
shoulders, 

3.  To  insist  on  the  reports, 

4.  To  take  the  deepest  interest  in  each  report,  with 
cordial  appreciation  of  efforts  and  improvement 

The  boy  should,  of  course,  be  given  a  good  watch 
and  a  reliable  alarm-clock.  The  question  of  rewards 
and  penalties  is  a  delicate  one,  but  personally  I  would 
advise  offering  the  most  liberal  and  attractive  rewards 
possible  for  clean  scores  or  steady  improvement,  with 
loss  of  privileges  such  as  picture-shows,  etc.,  for  low 
scores  or  lack  of  "pep." 

Such  methods  and  processes  will,  if  tried  in  the 
right  spirit,  relieve  the  parent  of  an  unnecessary 
burden,  make  a  childish  and  procrastinating  boy  self- 
reliant  and  business-like,  and  furnish  the  best  possible 
preparation  for  the  life  and  work  of  any  institution 

of  higher  education. 

(i) 


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